A Stitch in Haste

It's the chance dangers that I'm afraid of — the senseless, unpredictable dangers of a world falling apart. Consider the physical risks of complex machinery in the hands of blind fools and fear-crazed cowards. ... They'll reach the stage where no day will pass without a major wreck. ... Plane crashes, oil tank explosions, blast-furnace break-outs, high-tension wire electrocutions, subway cave-ins and trestle collapses — they'll see them all.

I think about that passage quite often. Guess I have to think about it some more:


Meanwhile:

"This is an absolute disgrace," [Manhattan Borough President Scott] Stringer said. "We need better inspection and more resources.

Maybe if Mr. Stringer had spent a little less of his resources on trash cans?

Of course, the irony, indeed the tragedy, is that when the government usurps safety and maintenance monitoring from the private sector, and then botches it, the "disgrace" in the politicians' minds is that government doesn't usurp even more.

As I commented elsewhere recently:

Safety certifications as a tragedy of the commons?

Let's review:

--Underwriters Laboratories, Good Housekeeping Seal, Consumer Reports, Moody's, etc.: Private (non-profit in some instances, but private). Not to mention Zagat's, TripAdvisor, U.S. News rankings, etc.

--USDA, FDA, CPSC, etc.: Government.

Are you really sure you want to play this game?

The government has crowded out private safety certification in food, drugs, etc., and you lament that strictly governmental failure as "the consequences of laissez faire"? Wow, just wow.

Do we have (semi-competent at best and lethal at worst) government safety bureaucracies because we have no private services to perform them, or do we have no private services to perform them because we have government safety bureaucracies?