From: Rafal Smigrodzki (rafal@smigrodzki.org)
Date: Thu Feb 13 2003 - 14:49:20 MST
Ron wrote:
> In a message dated 2/12/2003 9:29:30 AM Central Standard Time,
> rms2g@virginia.edu writes: Imagine that all participants in the
> economy would be required to obtain a general liability insurance of
> certain quality, in a market with many independent providers, and
> with a free-market court system.
>
> Rafal,
> Assuming that I understand what you are suggesting (Gee, that's
> chancy) let me try one more round of simplification.
> I have always read that we got into this mess where we need
> laws to stop polluters because back in the 19th Century we made a
> conscious decision to protect manufacturing, mining, etc., by
> removing the power to sue from individual citizens. Yep, we said
> those sectors of our economy were so important and needed
> encouragement to grow so bad that we wouldn't allow individuals to
> sue them for damages caused by pollution and who knows what else.
> If we want to stop pollution and other such offenses dead in
> its tracks why don't we restore the right of individuals to sue?
> Without even getting heavy in our treatment can you imagine the
> average polluters reaction to having 50 different individuals haul
> him into small claims court for damage to their paint jobs either on
> their car or their house or maybe both? You know long before
> OSHA, manufacturers lived in fear of their annual inspection by their
> insurance company -- those guys could cancel your insurance or worse
> yet raise the premiums. Many times the insurance guy's report took
> the form, "you are doing X. Correct that situation by doing Y and we
> won't raise your insurance premium by some astronomical amount Z."
> Things tended to get fixed. Ron H.
### Yes, this is what I mean. The ability to sue of course must be balanced
by appropriate safeguards, such as routine assessment of court costs to the
losing party, caps on punitive damages, appropriate standards for the use of
scientific evidence, drastic reduction in the number of statutes, and
perhaps other measures, but yes, I do think that this is a much better,
fine-grained instrument than OSHA's hammer.
Rafal
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