I couldn’t find anything to verify Exxon paid out $500 million to victims right away. My understanding is that amount was the actual damages they were sued for, and wasn’t arrived at until a jury made a determination in 1994. That’s five years, not “almost immediately.”
Look at the wiki page of the Exxon Valdez spill, and that of the EXXON SHIPPING CO. et al. v. BAKER et al..
And you figure the lawyers take a third of that.
Do you have a source for that?
If yes, I wouldn’t pay that much money to my lawyer. But what are you getting at? Should the government stop them from hiring lawyers who charge that much?
The payments averaged out to about $15,000 per plaintiff. I don’t know about you but that hardly sounds like adequate compensation for the loss of even a year’s pay, much less the loss of one’s livelihood through no fault of your own. One in six plaintiffs died before they got any money.
Based on what? Here’s the Supreme Court ruling in the largest lawsuit against Exxon, decided in 2008:
http://caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/scripts/getc…mp;invol=07-219
That is the current, and final ruling of the US Justice System on the matter. Please read it, and point out the specific outcomes in it, that you find unfair. Please provide evidence of the Court’s error and/or malice.
You are wrong in that it is not about simply throwing money at people and making it all go away. The fishing industry was devastated and still hasn’t fully recovered. The tourism industry took a hit and the continues to because the pristine area people came to visit, especially wildlife, hasn’t fully recovered. There are still 26,000 gallons of oil on the beaches that was never cleaned up. The impact goes on and on into the future.
Let’s say you back out of your driveway, and hit someone’s car, because you weren’t paying attention. What do you owe that person, and based on which principle? The same exact principle applies to this case.
A court of law, aided by experts, estimated the damages in the Exxon vs. Baker case at $287 million. That ruling is I’m sure also available some place. You’re welcome to find it and correct it. But until than I’ll take their word over your guesses.
Driving a cab may be more risky to one’s person, but that is beside the point. I can’t wreck my cab and cause billions of dollars in damages to others. Even if I could, try and collect it from my meager assets.
There are millions of cabs in the world, that easily kill far more people than drilling for oil ever could.
Again, aren’t there some limits as to the risks one should be allowed to take in society, risks that could endanger others or cause damage to others’ property,
The answer to that is no, but only with a modification: You may not act in a way that does endanger others. “Could” endanger others, on the other hand, does not mean it does endanger others. The government may not prevent future, potential crimes, only actual crimes. The reason: a future, potential crime cannot be known, those who claim to know it are in contradiction with human nature. The government must act on proof, and you cannot prove future human actions, because men have free will.
For instance the fact that I buy a gun does not mean I’ll kill my neighbor, so the government may not prevent the “risk” to my neighbor. There in fact is no risk, the claim that there is fundamentally illogical. The government must prove that I actually am a criminal, before they may use force against me.
The government may not prevent an oil company from drilling in the open ocean, to prevent them from neglecting the rig and spilling oil on the shore. They need proof of wrongdoing to use force against them. If the government is alerted to an actual rig, which is actually in a neglected state, and they have actual proof that this rig constitutes an actual threat to the shore, then they may act. But the level of threat must be objectively enforced, meaning that if you are willing to let the government act against an oil company based on the state of that rig that poses a threat to the shore, you must be prepared for them to act against you, when you pose a threat to a single person’s property.
e.g should I be able to erect a shoddily built apartment building at the top of a hill that may possibly crumble and destroy all the buildings below it?
This time, I’ll just say yes. The government needs evidence that the building is an actual threat, before they act. If you show up in Court and say “My neighbor’s house may possibly crumble on mine”, you should be thrown out. May possibly crumble is an entirely meaningless phrase, you might as well be smacking two pots together for the judge, hoping to get a favorable ruling. Anything may possibly crumble.
When you decide that the building is objectively a threat to your property, and you have proof, you may ask the government to act against the guy who owns it.
Does government have a compelling interest to moderate excessive risk by employing some oversight over certain activities, in order to protect the community from harm or property damage?
Same answer as before. Define your terms. What do you mean by community? What is being protected?
As far as I am concerned, the government is tasked solely with protecting individual rights. I certainly won’t concede that it has the right to do whatever it takes to protect the interests of an undefined entity, whatever you decide to call it.
