An open challenge to anyone who supports government regulations.

[LoneLaugher]

Fuck. When QW can't even get SniperFool to join the chorus, you know you have thread fail.

 

[Buford]

People who are timid, weak of character, and can't think for themselves love regulations. It gives them a sense of security in the big bad world.

 

[The T]

Drive your family on vacation in a car made without safety regulations on a road without speed limits. If you come back, tell us how it was.

You know of public roads without speed limits?

The Autobahn comes to mind, and that is not the only one.

Ah yes...but even they have limits to the areas where speeds aren't posted...but you are correct...

 

[uscitizen]

We don't need no stinkin regulations prohibiting gay marriage?

 

[Lakhota]

I am really fracking tired of explaining the facts of life to everyone who thinks regulations are good and lack of regulation kills people. I hereby issue a challenge.

Give me a single real world example of a regulation that has actually prevents deaths. I know there are a lot of idiots that are going to point at all sorts of things, like requiring seat belts in cars, and say that proves their point, but that is not going to cut it here. You need to prove that, without said regulation, people would die because no one would have...

1. Made seat belts in the first place,
2. Actually sell them if someone had made them,
3. Use them if both 1 and 2 were true.
4. That the end result is that no one dies.

Regulations are not designed to protect people from dangerous products, they are designed to limit liability in case someone actually gets hurt. Companies go to court all the time and argue that they are not liable because they met all applicable government regulations, and the government supports them in this. We live in crony capitalist world where the government makes choices about who lives and who dies based on what some number cruncher somewhere claims is for the common good.

There are soooo many: MSHA, OSHA...

 

[SniperFire]

We don't need no stinkin regulations prohibiting gay marriage?

Or marrying your sheep. Or your mother.

 

[occupied]

Anyone old enough to remember the horror of toxic dumping in the 60s-early 70s? People who bitch about the EPA must be too young to remember why it was formed in the first place. The same goes for other regulations, especially financial regulation, they have been in effect so long that people have forgotten that they were made for a reason.

 

[LoneLaugher]

People who are timid, weak of character, and can't think for themselves love regulations. It gives them a sense of security in the big bad world.

The opposite of which, of course, is the rugged individual. The romantic self-image of the insecure nutter.

 

[Toro]

Regulating drunk driving has prevented deaths.

Or do you want to argue that because government made it illegal to drink and drive, more people drink and drive because of government regulation.


Dumb thread.

 

[Toro]

Government regulations save lives on the job | Economic Policy Institute

 

[bobcollum]

You really want to shift to something besides cars if you want to prove your point because I can easily prove regulations actually kill people when we are talking about cars.

Auto Deaths a Side Effect of Higher Fuel Efficiency Standards

Crumple zones are smaller than they used to be because government regulations require cars to be of lower weight to meet gas mileage standards.

So crash test standards have never saved one life, then?

Let me hear you say it.

Can you prove that without federal standards cars would be more dangerous? Keep in mind that everything that the government has mandated for crash test survivability was developed by auto makers long before the government regulated it.

What you're asking for is impossible to produce, there aren't any stats kept on when nothing happens.

I could just as easily ask you to prove that they wouldn't be more dangerous.

 

[ladyliberal]

I am really fracking tired of explaining the facts of life to everyone who thinks regulations are good and lack of regulation kills people. I hereby issue a challenge.

Give me a single real world example of a regulation that has actually prevents deaths. I know there are a lot of idiots that are going to point at all sorts of things, like requiring seat belts in cars, and say that proves their point, but that is not going to cut it here. You need to prove that, without said regulation, people would die because no one would have...

1. Made seat belts in the first place,
2. Actually sell them if someone had made them,
3. Use them if both 1 and 2 were true.
4. That the end result is that no one dies.

Regulations are not designed to protect people from dangerous products, they are designed to limit liability in case someone actually gets hurt. Companies go to court all the time and argue that they are not liable because they met all applicable government regulations, and the government supports them in this. We live in crony capitalist world where the government makes choices about who lives and who dies based on what some number cruncher somewhere claims is for the common good.

A few questions:

1) Will you withdraw your suggestion that people who take you up on your challenge are "idiots"? One can hardly claim to fairly weigh an argument that one has previously deemed idiotic.

2) What sources of authority will you accept? Peer-reviewed academic studies? Government studies? Foreign studies? One must rely on some external authority, unless you expect one of us forum-dwellers to collect, document and analyze a large set of data ourselves in reply to your challenge.

3) How widely are you defining regulation? Historical regulation? Foreign regulation? Economic regulation? Criminal laws (i.e., drug laws that ban deadly drugs)? Excise taxes on deadly products (i.e., on cigarettes)?

4) What standard of proof do you require? Historical proof seems impossible, since you make a counterfactual requirement ("You need to prove that, without said regulation, people would die..."). Mathematical proof seems impossible due to the inherent lack of mathematical rigor. Experimental proof seems unlikely, since very few if any life-and-death regulations are imposed as part of a controlled experiment. Would you then accept statistical or econometric analysis, or is there another discipline which you deem appropriate?

5) Are you asking for a single regulation that saves lives, or proof that all regulations in total save lives? Your original post asks for the former, but the latter is implied in your post #8. The latter seems impossible to prove, since one cannot review all regulations in the history of the world.

6) What is your response to existing arguments that quantify the number of lives saved by regulations, as in the works cited in Orden Jurídico Nacional
or
http://web.iitd.ac.in/~arunku/files/CEL899_2011/Value of life_Graham.pdf
?


Depending on how you respond to those specifics, I would consider offering the following regulations:

1) Bans on deadly illegal drugs.
2) Taxes and other restrictions on cigarettes
3) Speed limits on public roads
4) Various EPA, OSHA

 

[bripat9643]

Do a study on US railroad safety and see why/when it improved.

It improved when the courts started awarding big settlements to workers who were injured on the job.

 

[bripat9643]

Government regulations save lives on the job | Economic Policy Institute

Post hoc, ero propter hoc - a logical fallacy. The fact that worker fatalities have been declining isn't proof the regulations work. Most companies have become concerned with worker safety because lawsuits are extremely detrimental to the bottom line.

 

[Quantum Windbag]

So crash test standards have never saved one life, then?

Let me hear you say it.

Can you prove that without federal standards cars would be more dangerous? Keep in mind that everything that the government has mandated for crash test survivability was developed by auto makers long before the government regulated it.

You aren't going to answer my question.

LOL

The answer to your question is regulations do not save lives.

 

[Quantum Windbag]

We don't need no stinkin regulations prohibiting gay marriage?

Certainly don't.

 

[Quantum Windbag]

Regulating drunk driving has prevented deaths.

Or do you want to argue that because government made it illegal to drink and drive, more people drink and drive because of government regulation.


Dumb thread.

Nobody drives drunk anymore? When did that happen?

 

[Quantum Windbag]

Government regulations save lives on the job | Economic Policy Institute

Correlation is not causation.

 

[g5000]

Give me a single real world example of a regulation that has actually prevents deaths.

A rule requiring the cotton industry to reduce dust in textile factories lowered the
prevalence of brown lung among industry employees by 97 percent;

A rule requiring employers to place locks and warning labels on powered equipment
is credited with preventing 50,000 injuries and 120 fatalities per year;

A rule on excavations at construction sites has reduced the fatality rate from cave-ins
by 40 percent;

A grain-handling facilities standard has reduced the number of fatalities caused by
dust-related explosions by 95 percent;

And a 1969 mine safety law led to a rapid 50 percent decrease in the coal mine
fatality rate.

Link.

 

[Quantum Windbag]

So crash test standards have never saved one life, then?

Let me hear you say it.

Can you prove that without federal standards cars would be more dangerous? Keep in mind that everything that the government has mandated for crash test survivability was developed by auto makers long before the government regulated it.

What you're asking for is impossible to produce, there aren't any stats kept on when nothing happens.

I could just as easily ask you to prove that they wouldn't be more dangerous.

Larger cars and trucks are safer than small cars. CAFE standards mandate fuel economy and force car companies to build smaller, lighter cars. QED CAFE standards make cars more dangerous.

Want me to prove anything else?