This sort of thing has always seemed to me to be the ultimate example of why we don't rely entirely on competition and the free market to provide us with "the best deal".
How can you know if your yellow sweets are coloured with lead chromate? How could you know all the millions of things you need to know about possible dangers so you can evaluate if some product that's 10% cheaper is actually not going to kill you?
It's only regulation and government interference that can make it manageable for the consumer.
In theory you would have independent, private organizations which people trusted to inspect manufacturing facilities and review products. In the U.S., those types of organizations existed before modern Federal regulations. For example, United States Pharmacopeia (USP) or Underwriters Laboratories (UL), both of which were founded in the 19th century. Both of those organizations still exist and their role has actually been incorporated into law.
> It's only regulation and government interference that can make it manageable for the consumer.
I would disagree with such a strong statement, but for various reasons I would agree that a purely private approach probably wouldn't be able to achieve the current degree of consumer safety in the U.S., though in less militantly individualistic societies perhaps it could. (Note that "the government", as in the police state, and institutions of social governance are not the same thing.)
Laws at least would be needed - otherwise such independent private entities could be bought off by the largest companies. Already such companies attempt to buy off governments anyhow with a degree of success.
>>How can you know if your yellow sweets are coloured with lead chromate?
Well because if they are then eventually someone will get sick, they will sue the company, the company will have to pay millions in damages, and it will have to stop using lead in their sweets, which will scare every other company away from trying to do the similar thing /s
Poe's law strikes again! There are in fact people that think like that, and have to be lead by the nose to waters of wisdom with the hopes of drinking a small bit.
Clearly the legal system has broken down (been deliberately broken), and the regulatory system has simultaneously broken down (been deliberately broken), so somebody's going to have to get a little creative relative to the norms that they were raised with, if they want to continue to actually have a society rather than a Lotka-Volterra equation.
The impetus towards revenge killings and blood debts successfully deterred malicious actions through most of human prehistory and even much of history. With the trend towards corporate consolidation, each CEO's exposure is actually pretty huge when "their actions result in the death of others". All that's necessary is a well-armed grieving family member and a social narrative that actually, yes, this is how we do things. All we're missing is the narrative.
And the geeks actually have the narrative. Cyberpunk is just the most aspirational dream of occasional justice that can exist within the confines of the America Reagan built, in the post-liberal corporatist society.
>> The personal, as everyone is so fucking fond of saying, is political. So if some idiot politician, some power player, tries to execute policies that harm you or those you care about, take it personally. Get angry. The Machinery of Justice will not serve you here – it is slow and cold, and it is theirs, hardware and soft-. Only the little people suffer at the hands of Justice; the creatures of power slide from under it with a wink and a grin. If you want justice, you will have to claw it from them. Make it personal. Do as much damage as you can. Get your message across. That way, you stand a better chance of being taken seriously next time. Of being considered dangerous. And make no mistake about this: being taken seriously, being considered dangerous marks the difference - the only difference in their eyes - between players and little people. Players they will make deals with. Little people they liquidate. And time and again they cream your liquidation, your displacement, your torture and brutal execution with the ultimate insult that it’s just business, it’s politics, it’s the way of the world, it’s a tough life and that it’s nothing personal. Well, fuck them. Make it personal. - Takeshi Kovacs, Altered Carbon
Mentioned in the article, the Pure Food and Drug Act of 1906 has an interesting history. It came about due to the work of Harvey Washington Wiley who used healthy volunteers to test and document the effects of then used preservatives like borax and formaldehyde. The volunteers were called "The Poison Squad". There's a PBS documentary about them: https://www.dailymotion.com/video/x8jbub8
I know it’s somewhat unpopular because of many things are labeled with insignificant quantities or are treated as a fact of life, but Prop 65 has to be my favorite ballot proposition.
I would rather know what potentially harmful substances are in something and decide if it’s acceptable than not be told at all.
Prop 65 threshold for level of harm is two orders of magnitude below any effect level (not the harm level, effect) which I’d argue creates so many false notices of harm that most people simply ignore them eroding trust in the government.
Indeed the level is so low that under the law, the daily recommended dose of vitamin A for pregnant women would need a notice saying it caused birth defects. They had to ignore the law and add a caveat for vitamin A since not taking it causes birth defects.
If they didn’t pick an arbitrary threshold, ignoring scientific consensus on what dose makes the poison, it would have been far more successful.
It might be your preference but prop 65 warnings have basically taught an entire generation that safety warnings are meaningless and can be ignored, which is presumably the opposite of the desired effect.
It includes everything from Aspirin, Aloe Vera leaf extract, Oral contraceptives and estrogens, Alcoholic beverages, Leather dust, Chinese style salted fish, to Benzene, Bracken Fern, and hexavalent chromium.
I loved how basically every apt I went in in SF had a "This apt may contain chemicals that may be known to cause cancer by the state of California. At the entrance.
How can you know if your yellow sweets are coloured with lead chromate? How could you know all the millions of things you need to know about possible dangers so you can evaluate if some product that's 10% cheaper is actually not going to kill you?
It's only regulation and government interference that can make it manageable for the consumer.