111–120 of 217 posts
Valuable stuff is worth paying more for.
http://www.amazon.com/End-Lawyers-Rethinking-Nature-Services...
Chapters
1. Introduction - the Beginning of the End? 2. The Path to Commoditization 3. Trends in Technology 4. Disruptive Legal Technologies 5. The Future for In-house Lawyers 6. Resolving and Avoiding Disputes 7. Access to Law and to Justice 8. Conclusion - the Future of Lawyers.
So, Forbes is republishing Quora answers now? This must be part of that new strategy where they try to gain more traffic ( http://www.forbes.com/sites/kashmirhill/2012/02/16/how-targe... ) with other people's content ( http://www.nytimes.com/2012/02/19/magazine/shopping-habits.h... ).
These answers are republished by Quora to Forbes, with permission from the original authors. See this for more info: http://www.quora.com/How-does-Forbes-decide-which-Quora-answ...
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"That's a description of a free market, but not a definition. (The OECD saying it's a definition don't make it so.)" Is that definitive? As the description of the definition of the noun 'definition' from http://thesaurus.com/browse/definition defines definition as a description, of this I am definite. ;)
Saying a definition is a description is a total dumbing down. I don't know why they don't teach this stuff in grade school anymore... they should. A definition must identify the nature of the units, i.e., the essential characteristics without which the units would not be the kind of existents they are. And The rules of correct definition are derived from the process of concept-formation. The units of a concept were d…
Definition, however, is a descriptive, not proscriptive term. Succinctly, the definition of a term is whatever a broad consensus "agree" upon. Dictionaries serve to help identify that consensus, although they are not completely authoritative. The definition of a word may not coincide with its essence in any way -- for example, the phrase "to beg the question" has two primary definitions. The first and newer definition is equivalent to "to ask the question." The second and older definition is to assume the conclusion within the question itself. Together these definitions do not elucidate the "essence" (or "distinguishing characteristic", in Ayn Rand's primitive terminology) because they are wholly unrelated to each other. Instead, they're simply descriptions of the common modes in which English-speaking society uses the phrase "beg the question."
The best example is your definition of the word definition. The word "definition" does not have any intrinsic meaning -- only that which we place on it. Moreover, the meaning can vary between subsets of the broader population -- your use of the word definition in no way coincides with my use of the term in formal mathematics. This doesn't mean that you can't disagree with a given definition for a word, only that you're insistence that you're correct or even that your definition has some objectively superior qualification makes your use of the word the "correct" one.
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> The market dynamics and model are entirely different with these sorts of emergency industries. Would you call auto-repair an emergency industry? After all, if you break down on the side of the road, you need assistance immediately? The vast majority of medical care is NOT given in an emergency situation. The same is true of legal services. And yes, auto repair as well.
So to answer your own question, when you are sick, need legal help, or stuck by the side of the road, do you comparison shop for best price or do you go to first available?
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Without a regulatory body it would be too easy for an unqualified person to pose as an electrician, doctor, dentist or lawyer. Do you really want someone with no experience or training wiring your house, pulling your teeth, operating on your knee, or defending you at trial?
I would like to have the choice, yes. I still can choose to pay more for someone with a demonstrable history, but if I want to take the risk on an unknown and save some money in the process, why shouldn't I be able to?
Take the electrician example: what happens if an unlicensed electrician kills himself when performing work? Does his family get to collect from your homeowner's insurance? Can they sue you? Are you criminally liable?
What about when you sell the house? Should you have to disclose that someone unlicensed did the wiring? What if you don't and the house ignites in a fire one night caused by improper wiring, killing the future owners, are you responsible? Is the electrician?
And you don't even want to touch the potential for abuse... regulation causes a lot of problems, I completely agree. But it serves to protect the public; we're effectively paying for protection against deception that capitalizes on our lack of knowledge in a specialty. That's worth protecting.
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You realize there are huge outsourcing industries (in the legal and accounting sector among others) where workers in India, China, etc. are trained to learn American standards, etc.
Most of those are doing the grunt work. But when it comes to go in the court who is going to go?
the way I had lawyer, dr, etc. fees explained was that they can charge so much as you often don't get a second chance. If your life is on the line for an operation, you want the best doctor available. Your life on the line in a trial, you get the best lawyer available. This has a trickle down effect. Or put another way, if you don't get a second chance, things had better go right the first time. Fear is a powerful mo…
This is the #1 reason, and the common explanation, but lets examine it further. You risk your life getting into your car every day. You don't pick the most expensive car? Choosing air travel is commonly an exercise in finding the lowest price, despite the inherent risks/fear of traveling 4 miles up at 500mph. Why are these commodities while preparing a will is not? There are transactions/disputes that require highly…
That's easy. The expense of a car or plane doesn't indicate it's safety, infact it's usually the opposite, the more expensive the car or plane the faster it goes and less safe it can make your trip.
With a doctor or lawyer more often than not the more you pay the better the service/advice you get.
> There are transactions/disputes that require highly skilled people to direct/settle, but I wonder how many legal systems have been specifically constructed to require guidance. How can we tell when something is costly because it is complex or merely complex to make it costly?
Completely agree with this.
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I appreciate the passion with which you advocate for decreased barriers to legal information. In many respects, I could not agree more; U.S. jurisprudence is synonymous with hyper-technical mutability, and the public is kept in the dark because of pay walls. But, that marks the full extent to which you and I agree on this matter. In terms of "institutionalized fraud," you are totally wrong. The legal profession is on…
And, just to be clear, lawyers' fees are reasonable because lawyers have a duty to report fraudulent billing practices. If they don't, they can be disbarred . That duty to report covers all of the rules (excluding Rule 1.6 and information gained by lawyers participating in approved lawyers' assistance programs), and the reasonableness of fees absolutely includes consideration for this duty.