Law in Contemporary Society

View   r7  >  r6  ...
RonMazorFirstPaper 7 - 20 Feb 2010 - Main.RonMazor
Line: 1 to 1
 
META TOPICPARENT name="FirstPaper"
Line: 36 to 36
 

Strict Liability Would Work in the Real World

Changed:
<
<		If the U.S. ran on a strict liability system, life wouldn't change much. Baseball stadiums might have more enclosed roofs. Hockey games might be shielded by higher glass. Insurance would be a lot more extensive and widespread. But strict liability wouldn't be a paradigm shift. Free enterprise would continue to exist. It'd just be safer.
>
>		If the U.S. ran on a strict liability system, life wouldn't change much. Baseball stadiums might have more enclosed roofs. Hockey games might be shielded by higher glass. Insurance would be a lot more extensive and widespread. But strict liability wouldn't be a paradigm shift. Free enterprise would continue to exist. It'd just be safer at the margins.
 I have heard the argument that strict liability would create an unacceptable incentive for companies to flout the law more often and simply pay damages. I think this is a stupid argument, for two reasons.
Line: 49 to 49
 When legal damages are less than the cost of precautions, companies behave negligently. This isn't a new phenomenon. Example: Eben's story of the Goodyear tire rims.
Changed:
<
<		The only real difference is that under strict liability, companies will always pay for the injuries they cause, and those that get injured will have full recourse under the law for any damage they endure.
>
>		The only real difference is that under strict liability, companies will always be liable for the injuries they cause, and those that get injured will have full recourse under the law for any damage they endure.
 

Conclusion

Changed:
<
<		An injury creates a grievance. Without compensation, we are leaving injured parties to suffer while the perpetrator of the injury is excused for having taken insufficient precautions.
>
>		An injury creates a grievance. Under negligence, we are occasionally leaving injured parties to suffer--grievance unsatisfied--while the perpetrator of the injury is excused for having taken insufficient precautions. This is not right.
 Ultimately, tort is about harm. As such, strict liability is the proper way to assess tort--what matters is the result, not the thought process.

Revision 7r7 - 20 Feb 2010 - 15:46:38 - RonMazor
Revision 6r6 - 20 Feb 2010 - 07:45:31 - RonMazor
This site is powered by the TWiki collaboration platform.
All material on this collaboration platform is the property of the contributing authors.
All material marked as authored by Eben Moglen is available under the license terms CC-BY-SA version 4.
Syndicate this site RSSATOM