Quote:
Originally Posted by kutulu
History shows that corporations will not spend extra money to ensure the safety of their employees unless they are forced to. Even now, there are companies that do a cost-benefit analysis of potential liabilities before they decide to do a recall. If the analysis says that it's cheaper to face potential lawsuits and pay out damages to injured people or their family (if the person is killed) instead of doing the right thing and get the product off the shelves, they keep it out there.
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Unfortunately this is true.
In the first decade of the 20th century, an average of ONE THOUSAND coal miners died every year.
Today, coal mining is one of the safer "dangerous" professions you can do, with annual deaths measured in the 10s or 20s (and significantly more miners than back then).
But it took numerous mining laws and the formation of MESA (later changed to MSHA) to make it so.
The non-mining industry has similar stories.
This is one reason why I am not a hard-core libertarian.
I know for a fact that the industries I've worked in for the majority of my working life (coal and meat-packing) would gut their safety programs if they thought they could.