Turkey’s earthquakes show the deadly extent of construction scams • Hacker News Board

Re: Turkey’s earthquakes show the deadly extent of construction scams

#101

Post by ornornor » Mon, Feb 13, 2023, 5:08 PM UTC

cm2187 wrote: post #92

commandlinefan wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> it's so frustrating I feel the same way developing software - the only thing that ever matters, and has ever mattered (at least since I started developing software in 1992) is "meeting the date". Whatever corners can be cut to make the date are cut, and then the thing breaks in fairly predictable ways because corners were cut. It's maddeningly infuriating and I'm not even dealing with people's lives here. I can't e…

Not sure what you are equating this to in software, but if it is security vulnerabilities, incompetence has probably more to do with it than time pressure. It takes about the time to write a parametrised query than to concatenate your strings.

The corners that are cut are often around automated testing, security, best practices. And it adds up, so if nothing is done right then it’s faster to keep doing it wrong than rearchitect or abstract everything so you can have a clean implementation.

Honestly, I haven’t been working that long (about a decade) but this general attitude from PHBs calling the shots in software makes me count the months until I can retire early and never write code for money again. It’s just soul sucking to fight everyone on this and then fight again when overtime is needed to add more bandaids to the resulting abomination because the date won’t be met.

Re: Turkey’s earthquakes show the deadly extent of construction scams

#102

Post by ouid » Mon, Feb 13, 2023, 5:09 PM UTC

mabbo wrote: post #10

My wife has worked in the 'enforcing building codes' sector of engineering for her entire career. And it's so frustrating to watch. Everyone - everyone - is certain that the codes are all overzealous and their little thing needs an exception. Politicians get elected promising to 'get rid of the red tape'. And then an event occurs and we learn why these building codes exist. Like workplace safety rules, they are writt…

autocorrelated risk + insensitivity to scale.

If 100 people died every week of building code violations in that time people would care more

Re: Turkey’s earthquakes show the deadly extent of construction scams

#103

Post by mschuster91 » Mon, Feb 13, 2023, 5:10 PM UTC

moosedev wrote: post #65

mschuster91 wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Like workplace safety rules, they are written in the blood of the dead. Or fire codes. Related off-topic reminder, in the hope it may save one life one day: please use this comment as a reminder to check upon the status of your smoke alarms, carbon monoxide alarms and fire extinguisher. At the very least every room where people sleep in should have a smoke alarm and every room with a furnace (boiler, oven, kitchen,…

And check your fire exits, if you live in a larger building. Know where the closest one is. Know where an alternative one is. Check they’re not locked or blocked.

Good point. I do the same whenever I'm at a crowded public venue - there have been enough catastrophes by stampedes and people unaware where to safely exit. Being able to actually keep calm in an emergency can and will save your life.

Re: Turkey’s earthquakes show the deadly extent of construction scams

#104

Post by tablespoon » Mon, Feb 13, 2023, 5:10 PM UTC

myself248 wrote: post #81

jl6 wrote: post #7

It’s not surprising at all that the lack of accountability goes right to the top, and it’s tragic that it takes an earthquake to expose the corruption. But Turkey is far from the only country with a corrupt, ticking-time-bomb of construction and infrastructure quality issues. Pretty much every low-to-middle income country has taken the semi-rational approach of cutting corners in order to do more with less. And the h…

"Do more with less" is perfectly fine and rational. "Do less with more and line my pockets along the way" is the problem. If customers were _paying less_ for the substandard construction they're getting, okay that's one thing. But if customers are paying more, and they _think_ they're getting sturdy code-compliant construction, but contractors at one or more levels are skimming money and using substandard materials a…

> "Do more with less" is perfectly fine and rational.

> ...

> If customers were _paying less_ for the substandard construction they're getting, okay that's one thing.

Not really. Customers are likely not in position to rationally make those kinds of trade-offs, and even if they were, there's a good chance they're not going to be the one to pay the price (e.g. they sell the home, and the purchaser N sales later dies because it collapsed due to the substandard construction).

Re: Turkey’s earthquakes show the deadly extent of construction scams

#105

Post by flavius29663 » Mon, Feb 13, 2023, 5:10 PM UTC

marcosdumay wrote: post #76

mabbo wrote: post #10

My wife has worked in the 'enforcing building codes' sector of engineering for her entire career. And it's so frustrating to watch. Everyone - everyone - is certain that the codes are all overzealous and their little thing needs an exception. Politicians get elected promising to 'get rid of the red tape'. And then an event occurs and we learn why these building codes exist. Like workplace safety rules, they are writt…

Well, the code is always overzealous (never met an exception), and the smaller the house the more overzealous it is. If it wasn't, we would have a much easier time persecuting people that breaks it, and much more public sympathy for large culprits that actually have much fewer (relatively to their capacity) strings over then than any random person. The same applies to fire codes.

> The same applies to fire codes.

As someone who has been close to almost-tragedies caused by fires, can you give me examples where fire codes are over-zealous? I've had family almost getting killed, even though they did follow the fire codes - the didn't even get a fine or a case against them. If you ask me, the fire codes were not strict enough in that instance.

Re: Turkey’s earthquakes show the deadly extent of construction scams

#106

Post by ornornor » Mon, Feb 13, 2023, 5:13 PM UTC

commandlinefan wrote: post #75

r_hoods_ghost wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's not because of building codes. That's because of people who don't believe in helping their fellow man through, oh I don't know, paying taxes, supporting the welfare state, paying living wages etc.

> don't believe in helping their fellow man Well, ok, since you started it - how much do you, personally, donate to homeless shelters and food banks? You have a lot of discretionary income to do so since your taxes are lower than you appear that you would like them to be.

Parent was talking about taxes, not quite the same as donating.

Re: Turkey’s earthquakes show the deadly extent of construction scams

#107

Post by catiopatio » Mon, Feb 13, 2023, 5:14 PM UTC

mabbo wrote: post #10

My wife has worked in the 'enforcing building codes' sector of engineering for her entire career. And it's so frustrating to watch. Everyone - everyone - is certain that the codes are all overzealous and their little thing needs an exception. Politicians get elected promising to 'get rid of the red tape'. And then an event occurs and we learn why these building codes exist. Like workplace safety rules, they are writt…

An increasing problem locally (Boulder) is the use of the permitting process to push high-cost climate goals on home owners, leading to them skipping permitting and inspection entirely.

Here, you’re required to choose at least three expensive improvements from a set of eight (iirc), ranging from relatively cheap (electric vehicle charger) to very expensive (rooftop solar).

My home was built in the 1970s, the bathrooms had mold and had to be gutted, and the place was in desperate need of a remodel just to be livable.

I already have rooftop solar and an electrical vehicle charger, but that’s not enough.

I was expected to spend roughly an extra $40k — on top of a $120k remodel — adding additional features and replacing perfectly good portions of my home to meet Boulder’s climate goals.

I can’t afford that, but my house isn’t livable as-is.

As a result, I’m having a bunch of work done without permitting or inspection.

I hate it, but that’s the Faustian bargain people choose when government tries to leverage safety regulations as a stick to enforce expensive, non-safety related ends.

Re: Turkey’s earthquakes show the deadly extent of construction scams

#108

Post by flavius29663 » Mon, Feb 13, 2023, 5:14 PM UTC

RetpolineDrama wrote: post #61

wnevets wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Reminds me so much of the vaccine "debate", "no one gets polio anymore, why do I need to get the polio vaccine?"

I mean that is kind of the _ultimate_ goal isn't it? -Vaccinate the population, eliminate the disease in humans -Eliminate the disease in any of its natural reservoirs Once you're certain it's gone why continue vaccination? There's cost to that and those resources can then be dedicated to "active" diseases (perhaps with the instructions for that vaccine archived somehow).

Not just cost, but also personal risk. Every injection (or drug) you put into your body carries a risk with it, especially a vaccine. People should get vaccinated, but pretending there is 0 risk associated with it just causes more antivaxxers IMO. And don't tell me that 0.001% chance is the same as 0% chance; for the one in 100k people injured by a vaccine, I can assure you it's not the same...

Re: Turkey’s earthquakes show the deadly extent of construction scams

#109

Post by ChainOfFools » Mon, Feb 13, 2023, 5:14 PM UTC

droopyEyelids wrote: post #19

mabbo wrote: post #10

My wife has worked in the 'enforcing building codes' sector of engineering for her entire career. And it's so frustrating to watch. Everyone - everyone - is certain that the codes are all overzealous and their little thing needs an exception. Politicians get elected promising to 'get rid of the red tape'. And then an event occurs and we learn why these building codes exist. Like workplace safety rules, they are writt…

Seems like it'd be smart to have a footnote or reference to the tragedy that informed the code on each section instead of allowing everything to be forgotten every couple years

This is sometimes done in a folk social engineering hack sort of way, by nicknaming certain pieces of legislation after those (usually children) whose tragedy inspired them. Amber's law, Megan's Law etc.

But even this strategy already reached oversaturation.

People just need to be more responsible, or else have fewer actions encoded as as rights instead of privileges.

Re: Turkey’s earthquakes show the deadly extent of construction scams

#110

Post by cguess » Mon, Feb 13, 2023, 5:15 PM UTC

commandlinefan wrote: post #75

r_hoods_ghost wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's not because of building codes. That's because of people who don't believe in helping their fellow man through, oh I don't know, paying taxes, supporting the welfare state, paying living wages etc.

> don't believe in helping their fellow man Well, ok, since you started it - how much do you, personally, donate to homeless shelters and food banks? You have a lot of discretionary income to do so since your taxes are lower than you appear that you would like them to be.

These shouldn't be supported by charity, thus the welfare state. It should be a burden put on all tax payers so that help can be provided beyond just what I feel like donating to. That's literally the point of taxes, and arguing that they should be higher isn't negated just because I personally don't donate to charities. It should be society as a whole (while given a progressive tax rate).