The people who sign it. Sheesh.
life and professional services have gotten so complex that the provider of such services really has the consumer at their mercy if all that protects the consumer is a contract put forward by the service provider.
Oh, please. Not the "world is too complicated for individual responsibility/we're too stupid to be free" argument.
The air in southern California is much cleaner today than it was 30 years ago, not because car manufacturers thought there was money to be made in manufacturing less polluting vehicles, but because they were required to do so by statute-imposed environmental standards.
I've been to Beijing, Managua,etc. I'm familiar with the problem. Air pollution is a classic case of the problem of collectively "owned" resources such as air. I don't see anything wrong with using the law to sort out costs imposed on other users of a shared resource.
A house is not communal property and its structure should not be dictated by the government. To argue otherwise is deny the existence of private property (a fait accompli at this point).
I understand your point. I just disagree. Your position makes sense in an ideal world, but in an ideal world, we wouldn't need laws.
And some of those costs might be in the form of required emission controls from point or mobile sources. While I've seen the concept trashed both here and on conservative talk radio (and some talk show hosts, frankly, are prime examples of "too stupid to be free"), the concept of saleable emission credits, as pioneered by the South Coast air district in LA, is an innovative, market-based approach to reducing air pollution, and far less coercive than a "one-size-fits-all" approach to reducing pollution. Interestingly, industries could have "freely" gotten together to implement such a system, but it required a regulation to actually make the market work, and give regulated industries the incentive to be involved.
For the record, I believe that American business, and Americans in general, are over-regulated. But that doesn't mean that I favor total elimination of all regulations. Government has a role, whether it's assuring adequate training and qualifications of physicians, or by leveling the playing field to assure that some large business doesn't stick it to some small business competitor through their unfair business practices, or by establishing building standards such that some 20 story building doesn't come tumbling down with the first stiff gust of wind. I know that position doesn't go down well here, but so be it...that's my view.