5 ms·

This still makes no sense. If a company with $1B in revenue, rolls something out to make $10M, then anything over $10M is suitable punishment - you turned a pr

by refurb 2y ago

This still makes no sense. If a company with $1B in revenue, rolls something out to make $10M, then anything over $10M is suitable punishment - you turned a profitable venture into a money losing venture.

dartos 2y ago
Yeah that works fine if the company in question is $1B. $10M is 1% of that company. That’s a deterrent. But if that company was $1T then that fine is effectively the cost of legal research. It won’t deter that company from trying to weasel their way around regulations in the future as the cost of trying justifies the potential upside.
- refurb 2y ago
  I disagree. It doesn’t matter if it’s a $1T company, the fine effectively turned their profitable decision into a loss. That seems like a reasonable approach. By your logic, if a company is running at a loss should the fine be negative?
  - dartos 2y ago
    > It doesn’t matter if it’s a $1T company, the fine effectively turned their profitable decision into a loss. Sure, but I don’t think just causing any amount of loss acts as a deterrent. Especially if the company is large enough to absorb the loss with no real consequences. > By your logic, if a company is running at a loss should the fine be negative? No, that’s a dumb question. A negative fine isn’t a fine and isn’t a deterrent… I don’t know what metric one should use to determine how to make a fine a deterrent. Maybe market cap? But the point of a fine is to be a deterrent.
    - refurb 2y ago
      > But the point of a fine is to be a deterrent. Is it? Or is it purely to make the action a net negative?
      - dartos 2y ago
        The purpose of a fine is to deter an action. Making an action a net negative _can_ act as a deterrent as in the $1B case earlier. The issue is that, at a certain scale, the risk of simply having an action be a net negative may be worth the potential upside. I honestly don’t understand what’s so disagreeable about this idea. What else would a fine be other than a serious deterrent to an illegal action? A mild annoyance? What else could the point be? I guess social retribution? But that’s just pointless.
        refurb 2y ago
        > The issue is that, at a certain scale, the risk of simply having an action be a net negative may be worth the potential upside I agree there, but if you're going to come up with a system of fines to incentivize not breaking the law, it needs to make sense. Just making it a huge numbers is likely to not even pass muster in the courts. A $10B company paying a $1B fine for sending out spam mail to 10 customers would be seen as "cruel and unusual punishment".

by refurb 2y ago

dartos 2y ago

Yeah that works fine if the company in question is $1B. $10M is 1% of that company. That’s a deterrent. But if that company was $1T then that fine is effectively the cost of legal research. It won’t deter that company from trying to weasel their way around regulations in the future as the cost of trying justifies the potential upside.

refurb 2y ago
I disagree. It doesn’t matter if it’s a $1T company, the fine effectively turned their profitable decision into a loss. That seems like a reasonable approach. By your logic, if a company is running at a loss should the fine be negative?
- dartos 2y ago
  > It doesn’t matter if it’s a $1T company, the fine effectively turned their profitable decision into a loss. Sure, but I don’t think just causing any amount of loss acts as a deterrent. Especially if the company is large enough to absorb the loss with no real consequences. > By your logic, if a company is running at a loss should the fine be negative? No, that’s a dumb question. A negative fine isn’t a fine and isn’t a deterrent… I don’t know what metric one should use to determine how to make a fine a deterrent. Maybe market cap? But the point of a fine is to be a deterrent.
  - refurb 2y ago
    > But the point of a fine is to be a deterrent. Is it? Or is it purely to make the action a net negative?
    - dartos 2y ago
      The purpose of a fine is to deter an action. Making an action a net negative _can_ act as a deterrent as in the $1B case earlier. The issue is that, at a certain scale, the risk of simply having an action be a net negative may be worth the potential upside. I honestly don’t understand what’s so disagreeable about this idea. What else would a fine be other than a serious deterrent to an illegal action? A mild annoyance? What else could the point be? I guess social retribution? But that’s just pointless.
      - refurb 2y ago
        > The issue is that, at a certain scale, the risk of simply having an action be a net negative may be worth the potential upside I agree there, but if you're going to come up with a system of fines to incentivize not breaking the law, it needs to make sense. Just making it a huge numbers is likely to not even pass muster in the courts. A $10B company paying a $1B fine for sending out spam mail to 10 customers would be seen as "cruel and unusual punishment".