Florida state of emergency with millions of gallons of “radioactive wastewater” • Hacker News Board

Re: Florida state of emergency with millions of gallons of “radioactive wastewater”

#141

Post by Can_Not » Mon, Apr 05, 2021, 2:51 PM UTC

darkerside wrote: post #50

voisin wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> When state officials hit the company with a multimillion-dollar fine for the damage done, it declared bankruptcy and shut down. This makes me furious. The employees and directors all go about their lives elsewhere with nary a scratch despite causing such a disaster. This is the problem with capitalism. Privatize profits, socialize losses. The only solution is to force companies to put up bonds or insurance sufficie…

This seems like mostly schadenfreude. What does it matter to you if they pay or we all do, assuming that we have more than enough as a society to pay for it, i.e. the benefits of capitalism outweigh the losses. The only impact is potential moral hazard, but that could be prevented with loss of licenses, etc.

Imagine if a guy stole your $500 TV, did $500 worth of damage to your window to get it, then sold it for $100. After he was caught, instead of going to jail his insurance was ordered to pay you $200.

Re: Florida state of emergency with millions of gallons of “radioactive wastewater”

#142

Post by natmaka » Mon, Apr 05, 2021, 2:56 PM UTC

Can_Not wrote: post #140

natmaka wrote: post #136

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Someone pays for losses" is always true. "Socialized losses", as far as I understand it, means that the group paying for the losses is the same one as the one which is/was the beneficiary. Does someone think that EU citizens were set to benefit from the Chernobyl plant?

The saying is usually more like "privatize the profits, socialize the loses", which is derived from "socialism for the rich and capitalism for the poor". The point of the phrase is that the people who are paying for the costs (tax payers) are not the ones who received any benefit or were going to benefit (profits, shareholders, CEOs, etc.). https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lemon_socialism

Indeed, however the case in point is the Chernobyl disaster, and in the USSR there AFAIK were no profits/shareholders/CEOs...

My point is that such scam isn't specific to the degraded version of capitalism so common in our nations, which is in fact "crony capitalism".

Re: Florida state of emergency with millions of gallons of “radioactive wastewater”

#143

Post by boomboomsubban » Mon, Apr 05, 2021, 6:09 PM UTC

koheripbal wrote: post #138

boomboomsubban wrote: post #137

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm going to guess the actual cost far out weighs the multimillion dollar fine levied against the company, which their insurance paid.

And I'm going to guess your guesses are based upon your existing world view, which you are just reinforcing with no additional data. That's how biases are formed.

The fines were described as being in the millions, what do you think the cost of this evacuation alone is? Hell, just the cost of the one employee constantly checking the levels for ~20 years is around a million. I don't have the exact data, but I have reasons for my guess.

Besides, you're criticizing me for the same thing you did by saying the insurance paid for the cleanup rather than the fine.

Re: Florida state of emergency with millions of gallons of “radioactive wastewater”

#144

Post by webinvest » Mon, Apr 05, 2021, 7:34 PM UTC

stillbourne wrote: post #126

There is only one way to fix this problem folks. Privatize the EPA, deregulate wastewater storage, and use the money saved to give the rich a tax cut. The rich will then trickle down into the reservoirs to save us from these problems.

Additionally, remove taxes on phosphate and fertilizer sales. Then raise taxes on state education to balance the offset. People will just learn to be happy and blissful.

Take it a step further and subsidize these phosphate pools. Pay for the subsidy by selling state bonds. Expect either the next generation of kids to pay all the bond principal and interest or cut state benefits for retired seniors. It will fix itself because Florida’s kids and retirees are more generous than Florida’s old phosphate miners. The kids and seniors will have a higher propensity to solve yesterday’s problems because they’re expected to save a higher percentage of their income compared to previous generations.

Obviously, /s.

Re: Florida state of emergency with millions of gallons of “radioactive wastewater”

#145

Post by koheripbal » Tue, Apr 06, 2021, 12:05 AM UTC

boomboomsubban wrote: post #143

koheripbal wrote: post #138

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And I'm going to guess your guesses are based upon your existing world view, which you are just reinforcing with no additional data. That's how biases are formed.

The fines were described as being in the millions, what do you think the cost of this evacuation alone is? Hell, just the cost of the one employee constantly checking the levels for ~20 years is around a million. I don't have the exact data, but I have reasons for my guess. Besides, you're criticizing me for the same thing you did by saying the insurance paid for the cleanup rather than the fine.

You just doubled down on your guesses with more guesses.

Re: Florida state of emergency with millions of gallons of “radioactive wastewater”

#146

Post by boomboomsubban » Tue, Apr 06, 2021, 1:07 AM UTC

koheripbal wrote: post #145

boomboomsubban wrote: post #143

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The fines were described as being in the millions, what do you think the cost of this evacuation alone is? Hell, just the cost of the one employee constantly checking the levels for ~20 years is around a million. I don't have the exact data, but I have reasons for my guess. Besides, you're criticizing me for the same thing you did by saying the insurance paid for the cleanup rather than the fine.

You just doubled down on your guesses with more guesses.

Yes, I guessed that twenty years of salary for a specialized public worker is around a million dollars. No real variation in their salary would make my point incorrect.

Why are you trying to make my "guesses" into a big deal rather than admit you misspoke about what the insurance company paid? Do you think that whatever fine they were levied predicted this necessary evacuation 20 years later?

Re: Florida state of emergency with millions of gallons of “radioactive wastewater”

#147

Post by Can_Not » Tue, Apr 06, 2021, 1:39 AM UTC

natmaka wrote: post #142

Can_Not wrote: post #140

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The saying is usually more like "privatize the profits, socialize the loses", which is derived from "socialism for the rich and capitalism for the poor". The point of the phrase is that the people who are paying for the costs (tax payers) are not the ones who received any benefit or were going to benefit (profits, shareholders, CEOs, etc.). https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lemon_socialism

Indeed, however the case in point is the Chernobyl disaster, and in the USSR there AFAIK were no profits/shareholders/CEOs... My point is that such scam isn't specific to the degraded version of capitalism so common in our nations, which is in fact "crony capitalism".

I always found the tribalistic "crony capitalism" vs "crony socialism" debate to be a convenient escape from actually discussing the removal of cronyism.

Re: Florida state of emergency with millions of gallons of “radioactive wastewater”

#148

Post by natmaka » Tue, Apr 06, 2021, 2:18 AM UTC

Can_Not wrote: post #147

natmaka wrote: post #142

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Indeed, however the case in point is the Chernobyl disaster, and in the USSR there AFAIK were no profits/shareholders/CEOs... My point is that such scam isn't specific to the degraded version of capitalism so common in our nations, which is in fact "crony capitalism".

I always found the tribalistic "crony capitalism" vs "crony socialism" debate to be a convenient escape from actually discussing the removal of cronyism.

So often true!

We patently cannot tackle cronyism thanks to any powerful institution. In fact anything powerful nurtures it.

Re: Florida state of emergency with millions of gallons of “radioactive wastewater”

#149

Post by lolthishuman » Tue, Apr 06, 2021, 2:24 AM UTC

peanut_worm wrote: post #139

lolthishuman wrote: post #66

Didn’t someone just hack Florida’s water or sewer system?

It was just the water system of a small city, just one county over from this. I need to get out of this state.

And I got downvoted for suggesting such. Shows you the state of things.

Re: Florida state of emergency with millions of gallons of “radioactive wastewater”

#150

Post by tjs8rj » Tue, Apr 06, 2021, 5:55 AM UTC

voisin wrote: post #61

roenxi wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I feel compelled, from the tone of the comment, to point this out: Limited liability isn't some surprise side effect of a corporation's legal structure, it is often right there in the name (Ltd, LLC, Pty Ltd, etc). Yes that structure lets people get away with harmful shenanigans. The system is biased towards optimism. Feature, not bug. The benefits and strengths of this have so far completely outweighed the costs to…

Limited Liability refers to the suppliers of capital, which often differ from the employees and directors that are responsible for the issues like in the article. I am fine with this since there is no moral hazard, but the parties involved / responsible should not be able to take their bonuses, click bankrupt and restart elsewhere under a new name. Society needs more protection, clearly.

With Limited Liability, your private assets as an agent are shielded, but only if you don't pierce the veil. Criminal acts pierce the veil, and the government is usually pretty happy to scoop up money when possible.

I suspect there's more to the story than just "oopsie, private company did evil thing and got rich but nobody was held responsible". More likely is that they did what they were supposed to do at least to the black letter of the law, but failed otherwise. The directors, managers, etc likely didn't break any laws.