Which is also counteracted by simple self interest on the part of people that don't want to die in their homes. Some of us, even those who rent, do consider what might happen in a disaster and choose to live in sturdier structures.
Its true that government standards get tightened and relaxed, just as they do in banking. Which is probably a good reason not to rely upon them. They are dumbed-down, lowest common denominator standards anyway.
I'm from the UK where virtually all houses are double-brick walls. I moved to Canada and even though (or rather especially because) I work in the siding industry (side note: the irony of a man who had never seen 'siding' being a competent siding installer has been pointed out many times) I have a rule that I'll only live in a brick-walled house for the simple reason that everywhere has ridiculously large and old trees. These trees tend to fall in big storms. In the past year I've seen ~5 houses where a tree has fallen and is resting on the 1st story brick wall and I can only hope no one was in the bedrooms at the time.
In a recent storm I saw a tree that had visibly fallen against a fully brick house and had merely slid down the wall. The house stood almost immaculate (aside from the smeared wall), with a broken window and a crushed fence.
I have noticed that roofers here in Ontario are rather lax in competency here. My in-laws townhouse just got re-shingled and they lost an entire shingle sheet (it had never been touched by a nail). Their neighbour in the building lost two shingles, one above the other, on a joint in the plywood and above the black-paper. They're lucky the management company got on the ass of the roofers and got it fixed as we got hit by about 50mm that weekend.
It's not just roofers. We've done a lot of runs out to repair siding jobs. We've seen entire siding sheets that had been installed with a single nail. They'll do like 2-3 rows with barely more than a nail per sheet and then nail an entire row properly, but because there's so much weight on the row that's nailed correctly that heavy-winds can cause the sheets to stretch and then when a big gust hits it can pop the sheet out of the lock.
B-b-b-but the shards from the broken window could have hurt you just as well!
Seriously, being used to solid reinforced concrete or brick buildings, building shoddy wood structures covered with paper-thin siding in tornado or hurricane alleys and then crying your eyes out when the inevitable happens is almost funny.
I'm in the UK and your comment made me realise that I've never lived in a brick building - they have all had stone walls. Having said that, I don't think I've ever lived anywhere that wasn't at least 150 years old (and I've lived in ten different properties).
Its true that government standards get tightened and relaxed, just as they do in banking. Which is probably a good reason not to rely upon them. They are dumbed-down, lowest common denominator standards anyway.