Posted on 03/18/2013 5:52:09 AM PDT by thackney
Why should the Pinto have been taken off the market?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ford_Pinto#Schwartz_paper
The government is a creature of the majority. It cannot protect minority rights. It does the will of the powerful - the wealthy, the politically connected, and the mob aka the people.
Have you ever read The Tyranny of the Majority?
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2216858/posts
I guess we will disagree and move on.
Without items like building codes, electrical codes, etc, doctors would have significant competition in the number of clients killed by other professions.
Thanks for that. .....
How did Monticello, which still stands today, or George Washingtons home get built? How did they survive?
At least in the building trades, most of the code is written by crony capitalists looking for a captive market. Innovations don’t have to be forced on people.
Plumbing, electric and carpentry work isn’t that hard and is mostly unchanged from centuries ago. The concepts are all well known and well understood. In Illinois you cannot use PEX for water supply lines, only copper. The purpose is to prevent cheap labor. It’s also illegal to change your own toilet or sink.
You cannot build a fence higher that 5’ without an inspection and a permit. That’s life saving?
Would you not attempt to mitigate lightning strikes against your facilities if there were no “controlling legal authority”?
Look up “mavens” they’re another way non-experts get information. You likely have a series of trusted go to people on a variety of topics you know too little about to make good decisions. They’re likely mavens.
We could do away with the majority of regulations and you’d not experience a reduction in safety, but an increase. How much laziness on the part of the participant is encouraged by thinking - this must be safe, government said so?
Plumbing, electric and carpentry work isn’t that hard
There is a huge change in the materials and equipment on the electrical side from say the 30's. If you gave most electricians that same equipment and materials, the item they would most likely build over time is a fire.
You cannot build a fence higher that 5’ without an inspection and a permit. That’s life saving?
You can make all the strawman arguments you want. I design electrical facilities for living. You are not changing my mind with them.
My experience with too many clients over the decades is too many want to save every dollar up front and are ignorant of the risk. The death rate working in the oil/gas industry would be horrendous without most of the codes we are required to follow. For some, legal threats are the only reason they don't proceed with that foolishness. On the individual level, they often expect to be able to move on to another project or company before the problems come to light, if they do before a disaster.
How much laziness on the part of the participant is encouraged by thinking - this must be safe, government said so?
Items like the National Electric Code, produced by the National Fire Protection Agency, are not written government officials. They are produced mostly by the work of volunteers, and some paid staff, who review the current construction methods, material development, past fire/explosion history, etc. The only real impact government has on such safety codes is making them required, after they are developed. Often, states will wait several years making new revisions get proven before they will adopt them and require them.
The only place I have dealt with where government makes the electrical code is Clark County (Vegas) Nevada. They adopt the NEC then write their own special exceptions and requirements to meet the local pay-offs.
I was talking residential, not industrial, sorry.
How about one last argument, no straw, but just a man?
You.
Imagine the complete absence of any electrical code at all. How would you specify and build your facilities?
I would have to do so much immense amount of research, no significant facility could be built in a reasonable cost and time frame.
And on the residential side, you would be amazed at the amount of dangerous installations are done outside the range of proper inspection. I've done volunteer work at a couple of churches over the years, fixing dangerous existing installations from people with good intentions but limited knowledge and funds.
The important thing to remember about most safety regulations, typically they are written in blood. Almost never are they changed due to someone's theory. They are almost always in response to something going wrong. Typically, it won't gain recognition without death or disability; dollars along make for very slow code updates.
I will also admit, that earlier in my career, I did things endangering my own life as well as others, mostly due to lack of understanding of the danger.
Good Judgment comes from Experience.
Experience usually comes from surviving Bad Judgment.
Better to learn from the bad judgment of others.
Which is documented in the codes after significant review by several recognized peers in the industry. I can buy a book with all kinds of crap in it as the opinion of one person. The engineering societies that produce the codes give real review to the design requirements.
Sorry, I’m writing poorly. What if the government didn’t enforce the codes? They’d still exist. They’d remain the standard and the tort system would manage violations.
I don't agree. If they were just a suggestions, the people and companies would not invest the time and expense to produce them.
By mandating them, manufacturing companies spend dollars sending experts to keep the playing field level. If the breakers, wiring, motors are not held to those standards, far too many would just buy the cheapest Chinese junk they could find.
Sometime this gives a manufacture a significant advantage. When the first GFCI breakers & receptacles came out, they were hugely expensive and very few companies made them. Without the legal requirement to install them, the volume of sales would never have climbed to bring the price down to a more reasonable level.
They’d remain the standard and the tort system would manage violations.
Too many companies in today's code requirements are willing to cut corners hoping they won't kill people too often. I am not willing to be like some 3rd world countries (where I have worked before) that views paying of the family of the occasional dead is cheaper than building safely in the first place.
I think you’re proving that the codes don’t reflect the actual risk. If the market isn’t demanding GFCIs then the risk isn’t there.
I’ve lived in old homes all my life and never lost a family member, despite these homes not having GFCIs, arc fault breakers, carbon monoxide detectors, etc.
Being “doubly safe” doesn’t save 100% more lives.
What would happen is people like you would create high quality systems and standards. Some would meet or exceed those, some would innovate your standards out of existence. What government enforced codes do is reward crony capitatlists and delay innovators.
Do all new homes need sprinkler systems in your community? This despite the fact that home fires continue to fall?
We are not going to agree.
I’ve done work in countries where such codes are not required. I would not want my family living there.
Cheers.
OK, I’ve lived in countries without those standards and it wasn’t so bad.
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