[piekvorst]

If I buy a can of soup and find glass in it, I have a valid claim against the manufacturer. It's a matter of holding someone accountable for fraud or negligence, not a matter of regulation. The proper route is a court, not a bureaucratic agency that preemptively dictates production methods on the assumption that every manufacturer is a potential prisoner.

> get in my face if I don’t follow their rules

If a shopkeeper asks me to leave because I refuse to follow his rules, he's exercising his right to control his own property, he's not initiating force.

> You’re selling your freedom to big corporations.

I'm not selling my freedom to corporations, they can't throw me in jail, or take my property by edict. The government, by contrast, holds a legal monopoly on force.

I am not an American, so I cannot diagnose declining life expectancy, homelessness, poor food, and other problems from afar. But I do know this: personal problems don't give one a moral claim on other people's labor. Need does not justify compulsion, and citizens are not sacrificial animals.

> I am an unfree European blinded by communism.

You hinted that Europe's communist past was somehow not a cautionary tale.

> The perfect example of cognitive dissonance!

Dressed-up ad hominem. You have no idea what I do or don't hold in my mind.

[1718627440]

> If I buy a can of soup and find glass in it, I have a valid claim against the manufacturer.

Only because there is a court system provided by the state and because there is regulation that says that soup doesn't contain glass. Otherwise the manufacturer can just say "You didn't want glass in your soup, sucks, but for us glass in soup is part of the accepted distribution. Be happy that you got additional glass for free." .

[ahf8Aithaex7Nai]

> not a bureaucratic agency that preemptively dictates production methods on the assumption that every manufacturer is a potential prisoner.

I see it exactly the other way around. I want this to be clarified upfront, not after I’ve already cut my tongue. What I don’t understand is why market participants are being given special treatment here. There are laws, and they must be followed. That applies just as much in other areas.

> personal problems don't give one a moral claim on other people's labor

Which problem is personal and which isn't? You seem to be twisting this to suit your questionable argument.

> You have no idea what I do or don't hold in my mind

But I read what you write and interpret it. Just as you read what I write and interpret it. Here’s another ad hominem for you: in your worldview, there is no morality at all. At least, none that is consistent. People like you behave toward the state like moody teenagers toward their parents. You don’t want to be told what to do, but you wouldn’t survive a single month without the institution you so despise.

[piekvorst]

> why market participants are being given special treatment here. There are laws, and they must be followed.

Laws are contextual, they depend on more fundamental principles. A regulation that says "you must use this specific screw size" isn't a law in the same sense as "you shall not murder." When a "law" violates the principle of non-initiation of force, when it tells a manufacturer how to exercise his property rights under threat of imprisonment, it's not really a law but edict.

The issue is who decides and when. A court decides after harm occurs, based on evidence of actual negligence or fraud. A regulatory agency decides before anyone does anything, based on hypothetical risks, and compels compliance under threat of force.

> Which problem is personal and which isn't?

A personal problem is one that doesn't involve the infringement of rights against another person. Most problems are personal. One's homelessness doesn't give one a right to another's property. The moment you say "your need obligates me," you've crossed the line into compulsion.

> in your worldview, there is no morality at all. . . . People like you behave toward the state like moody teenagers toward their parents.

That tells me enough about the depth of your study on this subject. Morality is a science of identifying the principles by which a rational being sustains his life. You're not discussing that science, you're reaching for a metaphor.

> But I read what you write and interpret it.

"Cognitive dissonance" is an accusation about the state of my mind, not an interpretation. You don't get to call me internally contradictory and then say "I'm just interpreting."

[eszed]

Yeah, that guy got unnecessarily personal. Let me try.

You're right that civil judgements (and, though you haven't mentioned it yet, reputational brand damage through public exposure) are important checks on harm, but they break down in particular circumstances. In the first place, they're not a fair fight: corporations are able to limit, or even prevent, access to the court system by forced arbitration, jurisdiction changes, or intentionally running up attorney fees beyond what any plaintiffs can afford to risk. They also have ($£€¥, again) larger megaphones than any individual can reliably command.

The toy example of glass in a soup can makes for a perfect case, but civil suits are impossible to pursue where harms are long-term, diffuse, cumulative, or simply too difficult for a jury of lay-people to understand. For instance, we all know that lead is harmful, but when multiple sources of lead exist it's impossible to prove (to the standard correctly required by the courts) that this company's lead caused your particular illness. It's similarly impossible to prove that any particular cancer-causing agent caused any particular cancer, even when we know statistically that it has raised the cancer risk profile of millions of people, and therefore been a causative factor in many deaths.

If we insist that the only mechanism for redress be individual companies held to account in individual cases, we either give up on the idea that corporate behavior can be aligned with the public interest, or (worse?) we make sure that politically-disfavored companies will be scapegoated by the media or the courts, while better-connected players get away with anything at all.

Please allow me to forestall one possible counter-argument: if you, as my Libertarian-ish relatives do, reject outright the idea of "public interest", then we won't have much to say to each other: our world-views are simply too different. Otherwise, I'm interested in what you have to say.

[piekvorst]

I don't know the precise legal mechanisms for handling diffuse harms like the ones you describe. Determining the best means of applying the principle of suing corporations in practice is an very complex question that belongs to the philosophy of law. My task here is only to establish the nature of the principle and to show that it is practicable.

That said, here is my principle: at any time, the government is orders of magnitude more powerful than any corporation. I think it is proper, in some cases, for the government itself to act as a plaintiff, to aggregate evidence, bring suit, and prove causation statistically. I can't delimit that role precisely, but I side with you that in some cases only the government has access to all necessary evidence.

And no, I don't agree with the idea of "public interest." Any claim that "the public interest" supersedes private rights means that the interests of some men are to be sacrificed to the interests of others.

[eszed]

> the government is orders of magnitude more powerful than any corporation.

As a practical matter, that's untrue in many, many places around the world, and there are no reasons why it couldn't become true in the USA, or any other advanced democracy. Even if you don't think that is yet the case where you live, can you at least agree with me that many leaders of / investors in large corporations want it to be, and are working towards that end?

I think your position in your second paragraph is at odds with your position in the third.

[piekvorst]

I do agree. In many places, governments are weak, captured, or corrupt. But those are mixed economies, in which state and corporate power fuse into one corrupt swamp: corporations lobby for regulations to crush rivals, officials sell favors. That's not evidence that economic power equals political power, it's evidence that abandoning the principle of a government limited to retaliatory force produces a cold civil war of pressure groups. The solution isn't more regulation, it's total separation of state and economics.

> your second paragraph is at odds with your third

No. The government acting as plaintiff is still retaliatory force: harm occurred, the state helps identify the perpetrator. That's not "public interest" overriding private rights, it's the government protecting individual rights by standing in for many individuals who share a common injury.

And yes, corporate leaders want political power. That's cronyism. They want to use force because they can't win in a free market. It's a road to dictatorship, but the road is laid by the principle of "public interest," not unlimited profit motives.

There's no such thing as "the public," only individuals. When one treats "the public" as a blank check to override private rights, one is really saying: some people get sacrificed to others. The taxi industry lobbying to ban Uber isn't about safety or competition. "Affordable housing" mandates that force landlords to subsidize strangers aren't compassion. This institutionalized cold civil war won't end until the state stops pickign winners.

[fastaguy88]

>>> If I buy a can of soup and find glass in it, I have a valid claim against the manufacturer. It's a matter of holding someone accountable for fraud or negligence, not a matter of regulation. The proper route is a court, not a bureaucratic agency that preemptively dictates production methods on the assumption that every manufacturer is a potential prisoner.

This is a common conservative trope. We don't need regulation because customers can always sue. (Famous interview with Milton Friedman.) Good luck finding a lawyer who will sue because of some glass in your soup can, or, for more serious cases, who can out last (or match the spending of) a billion dollar corporation. Yes, sometimes the underdog wins. Rich people can sue, and may not need the governments regulatory help. For most people, there is absolutely no recourse, particular for technically complex things, like prescription drugs.

The idea that the legal system can consistently make better informed technical decisions than government scientists is not well supported by the evidence.

[rjmunro]

> If I buy a can of soup and find glass in it, I have a valid claim against the manufacturer.

What does that mean?

[piekvorst]

It means you can sue for product liability under common law. Negligence, breach of warranty, or strict liability, depending on jurisdiction. Court decides after harm.

[sham1]

And pray tell, who comes up with common law? And who enforces the judgment of the court? And what gives the court the authority to judge on the matter of glass shards in your tomato paste?

Fun fact about the common law in fact is that it came into existence because the English government after the Norman conquest needed a unified theory of law for the king's courts that was distinct from manorial and canon laws. 1154 Henry 2 the Plantagenet ascended the throne and wanted a code of law that would apply everywhere in the realm as opposed to local laws, the aforementioned manorial laws, as well as being secular, unlike canon law.

So without the government, you wouldn't have this common law your legal theory relies on.

[pixl97]

Right, this typically works very well after you spend tens to hundreds of thousands of dollars getting all the stuff to court in the first place to have a trial drag on for years in discovery all the while the hospital is sending out debt collectors.

Oh, that's if it wasn't actually a shell company in the first place that has no assets.

A good portion of the things you mention existed before we had food regulations, you could sue the business if you had issues with them. The problem is the vast portion of the population is far too poor to do that. Regulations stop the harm before it happens.

[piekvorst]

My claim is narrower: the principle of retaliatory force is practicable. That is, a society can function using only courts, class actions, and government-as-plaintiff, without preemptive editcs on screw sizes or battery compartments.

As I said earlier in this thread:

> Determining the best means of applying the principle of suing corporations in practice is an very complex question that belongs to the philosophy of law.

[pixl97]

>My claim is narrower: the principle of retaliatory force is practicable

Ah yes, the school of theory that says it's better to clean up the spilled milk after its been contaminated with uranium waste.

[piekvorst]

You’re assuming that without preemptive permits, nothing stops a company from spewing uranium. But liability, if properly enforced, is a powerful deterrent. The threat of paying full cleanup costs, compensating victims, and facing criminal charges for negligence doesn’t require an official to approve one’s pipe size in advance.

Further, the principle doesn’t deny retaliating in advance when violence can be objectively anticipated.

[vrganj]

Sue them in who's court? With who to enforce the ruling?

The... government?

[piekvorst]

Courts, police, and the army are proper. That's government. The difference is what kind of government. A proper government holds a monopoly on retaliatory force, it acts after someone initiates force or fraud. It doesn't dictate your screw size, battery compartment, or production method before you've harmed anyone.

[roboror]

Are there laws and lawmakers in this scenario?

[piekvorst]

Yes, to settle disputes. The purpose of these laws is the protection of individual rights, not consumer “rights” or any other special “rights” that belong exclusively to one group or race and no other.

[vrganj]

...why? This sounds incredibly arbitrary.

[piekvorst]

It's not arbitrary. It's called the distinction between retaliatory and preemptive force. Retaliatory force requires a victim and evidence of causation. Preemptive force has no objective anchor, hence arbitrary by definition. You can't jail a man for a crime he might commit tomorrow.