# What is the "small/no government" solution to the BP spill? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [July 7, 2010, 3:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-small-no-government-solution-to-the-bp-spill/545868 "2010-07-07T15:17:01Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![villa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/bc79bd/32.png) [@villa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/villa)\ **Post date:** [July 7, 2010, 7:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-small-no-government-solution-to-the-bp-spill/545868/21 "2010-07-07T19:57:50Z")
> [@puddleglum](#): > > The people who are hurt, if there was no one harmed, there is no tort. So absent an individual owner, there is no liability for BP. Good to know the destruction of Gulf wildlife has done no harm and requires no recompense. ---
**Author:** ![smiling\_bandit](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e9a140/32.png) [@smiling\_bandit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/smiling_bandit)\ **Post date:** [July 7, 2010, 7:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-small-no-government-solution-to-the-bp-spill/545868/22 "2010-07-07T19:58:34Z")
> [@kittenblue](#): > > So how, exactly, would that work, from an employment standpoint? > > Bear in mind I have recently set up a display for the Despicable Me movie that involved inflatable Minion characters, so I have this picture in my head of inflatable government staffers, folded up and shoved in packing crates when not needed. As a practical matter, I’d like to see pools of workers and more outsourcing. A smaller and leaner department can get a lot more done if it has fewer budget constraints and doesn’t have to perform at that level permanently. And of course, I propose (not here for brevity reasons) cutting a great many departments outright. The worker pools can always be used for _something_, but can be easily sent to fill whatever manpower need is pressing in a crisis. ---
**Author:** ![Malthus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/85f322/32.png) [@Malthus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Malthus)\ **Post date:** [July 7, 2010, 7:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-small-no-government-solution-to-the-bp-spill/545868/23 "2010-07-07T19:58:43Z")
To my mind at least, ‘small government’ implies a government restricted to those areas where the market or private litigation is not an efficient solution. Prevention of, and response to, major disasters - through regulation and the like - therefore falls within the ambit of what even ‘small government’ theorists would want a government to do. It is similar to the problem of international conflict. ‘Small government’ and ‘big government’ are not noticibly different when it comes to having an army; that simply falls within the sphere of what the minimal government _ought_ to be doing. ---
**Author:** ![villa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/bc79bd/32.png) [@villa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/villa)\ **Post date:** [July 7, 2010, 8:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-small-no-government-solution-to-the-bp-spill/545868/24 "2010-07-07T20:03:23Z")
> [@smiling\_bandit](#): > > As a practical matter, I’d like to see pools of workers and more outsourcing. Which of course has the wonderful benefit for you of undermining any unionization and gets rid of a lot of the troublesome “rights” that are given to employees. ---
**Author:** ![Tom\_Tildrum](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/e95f7d/32.png) [@Tom\_Tildrum](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tom_Tildrum)\ **Post date:** [July 7, 2010, 8:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-small-no-government-solution-to-the-bp-spill/545868/25 "2010-07-07T20:10:42Z")
> [@jsgoddess](#): > > …it shows that regulations are needed and must be enforced. There were market incentives for BP to avoid this catastrophe and they failed. There were regulations intended to avoid this catastrophe and they failed. Simply positing that we need regulations that work, without explaining how to avoid the same regulatory failures that already occurred, strikes me as just the flip side of saying “let the market sort it out,” without addressing why and how the market failed. In practice, I think we are likely going to muddle on with both market investors and regulators raising their scrutiny and being warier of the sorts of failures that led to this disaster. ---
**Author:** ![Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e8c25b/32.png) [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)\ **Post date:** [July 7, 2010, 8:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-small-no-government-solution-to-the-bp-spill/545868/26 "2010-07-07T20:31:46Z")
> [@puddleglum](#): > > The people who are hurt, if there was no one harmed, there is no tort. > [@whole\_bean](#): > > And this is why tort law is inadequate to address environmental disasters like DH. Yours is an oversimplification and like most oversimplifications, pretty worthless in a discussion of complex issues. This. ---
**Author:** ![panache45](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/panache45/32/64_2.png) [@panache45](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/panache45)\ **Post date:** [July 7, 2010, 8:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-small-no-government-solution-to-the-bp-spill/545868/27 "2010-07-07T20:49:31Z")
Channeling my former libertarian self, from decades ago, I would have considered it an invasion . . . no different than an armed attack on our shoreline. The navy/marines/coast guard would have defended the shoreline, while the government would deal directly with BP in court. ---
**Author:** ![Enderw24](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/ba9def/32.png) [@Enderw24](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Enderw24)\ **Post date:** [July 7, 2010, 8:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-small-no-government-solution-to-the-bp-spill/545868/28 "2010-07-07T20:52:02Z")
> [@puddleglum](#): > > What agencies? The compensation comes from tort law. In the case of Exxon Valdez (which is now dwarfed by the D.H. disaster which grows larger every day) it took 19 years for all the cases to get wrapped up in court. Ninteen years. If you were harmed because of BP’s negligence, would you expect or prefer to be made whole in the year 2029? On the assumption that you could afford to continue litigating the dispute (despite being run out of business because of BP’s negligence), how much money do you believe you’d owe in legal fees by 2028? Or would you prefer a quicker resolution to the matter mandated by law? ---
**Author:** ![Revenant\_Threshold](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/f1d935/32.png) [@Revenant\_Threshold](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Revenant_Threshold)\ **Post date:** [July 7, 2010, 9:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-small-no-government-solution-to-the-bp-spill/545868/29 "2010-07-07T21:23:54Z")
> [@smiling\_bandit](#): > > As a practical matter, I’d like to see pools of workers and more outsourcing. A smaller and leaner department can get a lot more done if it has fewer budget constraints and doesn’t have to perform at that level permanently. And of course, I propose (not here for brevity reasons) cutting a great many departments outright. The worker pools can always be used for _something_, but can be easily sent to fill whatever manpower need is pressing in a crisis. How would you avoid the problems of impermanent outsourcing groups being able to secure a monopoly on work, and then influence over both continuing to have work shoved their way and over governmental policy? ---
**Author:** ![Magiver](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/4491bb/32.png) [@Magiver](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Magiver)\ **Post date:** [July 7, 2010, 9:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-small-no-government-solution-to-the-bp-spill/545868/30 "2010-07-07T21:36:03Z")
> [@jsgoddess](#): > > To me, this is a case that demonstrates just how necessary the government is to hold BP responsible for the ways in which their actions impact others and the environment, and it shows that regulations are needed and must be enforced. > > What’s the other side? There is no other side to a strawman. Nobody is advocating no government or no regulations. What BP did was criminal negligence. They had a poor safety record and the government did nothing in the way of improving it. Not only was BP’s feet not held to the fire, they were finalists for an environmental safety award. ---
**Author:** ![Voyager](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/voyager/32/133_2.png) [@Voyager](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Voyager)\ **Post date:** [July 7, 2010, 11:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-small-no-government-solution-to-the-bp-spill/545868/31 "2010-07-07T23:00:15Z")
> [@smiling\_bandit](#): > > As a practical matter, I’d like to see pools of workers and more outsourcing. A smaller and leaner department can get a lot more done if it has fewer budget constraints and doesn’t have to perform at that level permanently. And of course, I propose (not here for brevity reasons) cutting a great many departments outright. The worker pools can always be used for _something_, but can be easily sent to fill whatever manpower need is pressing in a crisis. Well, since outsourcing was such a success in Iraq (don’t touch that shower!) I’m sure it will work fine. As for your independent inspections idea, that is what we have for rating bonds today. Pretty soon a small government proponent would say that the oil companies should pay for the inspections (only fair, right) and we’re in trouble again. You seem to also be assuming that all employees are interchangeable. Those who can deal with the effects of a hurricane are not the same as those who can deal with a stock market meltdown. ---
**Author:** ![Voyager](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/voyager/32/133_2.png) [@Voyager](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Voyager)\ **Post date:** [July 7, 2010, 11:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-small-no-government-solution-to-the-bp-spill/545868/32 "2010-07-07T23:12:24Z")
> [@Tom\_Tildrum](#): > > There were market incentives for BP to avoid this catastrophe and they failed. There were regulations intended to avoid this catastrophe and they failed. > > Simply positing that we need regulations that work, without explaining how to avoid the same regulatory failures that already occurred, strikes me as just the flip side of saying “let the market sort it out,” without addressing why and how the market failed. > > In practice, I think we are likely going to muddle on with both market investors and regulators raising their scrutiny and being warier of the sorts of failures that led to this disaster. As we’ve seen, regulations themselves do nothing. Regulations have to be enforced by competent and committed regulators. If the management of the regulatory agencies believe that market incentives will do the job, and that enforcing regulations impacts the competitiveness of the companies and is therefore an evil, if somewhat necessary, then we have the situation we have today. It wasn’t just MMC - the SEC fell down on the job pretty badly also. If BP knew a disaster was coming, there would be incentives to avoid it. If AIG knew the housing market was going to collapse, there would be incentives to avoid selling all that product also. But at the time you are faced with cutting corners or selling derivatives which improve the bottom line immediately versus not doing it, not being competitive, and possibly avoiding a low probability event. Do we know that only BP was doing dangerous things? If other companies were also, now they can fix things, and they saved money through cutting corners and got away with it. Wall Street had whole departments assessing risk and they still screwed up. What regulation is for is to stop behavior which is attractive right now but may have long term consequences. That is not something you can expect companies which have to make their quarterly numbers to do. ---
**Author:** ![whole\_bean](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/96bed5/32.png) [@whole\_bean](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/whole_bean)\ **Post date:** [July 8, 2010, 5:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-small-no-government-solution-to-the-bp-spill/545868/33 "2010-07-08T17:50:04Z")
> [@smiling\_bandit](#): > > You don’t like the solution. So what? It’s small enough for me to be comfortable with - far smaller than we have today. The fact that you don’t like that I am not some mythical ideologically pure mega-Libertarian doesn’t bother me. The OP doesn’t raise any issues. She asks a question (badly). Of course the OP raises issues. From the OP: > [@](#): > > Those on the right often, but not always, complain about the existence of some, if not all, governmental regulations. I’ve heard suggestions about getting rid of the FDA and letting the market sort it out, for example. > > Okay, so given a world with less or no governmental intervention or regulation on BP, what would now be different? I’d posit that you can’t just say “They would have drilled in shallow water” since property rights would still exist in a small or no government world and they still might not have the drilling rights. The obvious issue being raised is, absent regulation, how do you prevent DH. Related to that, in a smaller government world, how do you respond to DH You offered, among other things > [@](#): > > I’d hire companies - multiple independant companies - to carry out inspections. Any bad grade would require I’d also require regular disaster-recovery plans to be filed - but in contrast to the feds, would emphasize knowing what people plan on doing rather than trying to force them into one mold. Molds are usually bad, popular though they be with bureaucracies. This frees up a lot of government space for more useful things . . . Likewise, I consider emergency preparedness a watchword. If you are going to spend money, sopending it on backups is an extremely good way to do it. Personally, I’d like to become director of FEMA just to spend my time doing that. However, in contrast to trying to maintain fleets of ships myself, or some nonsense like that, I’d constantly maintain a source list of where I can get them, crew and all, ready to go. Nothing in this response concerns the overall size of the government, only what you (as the government) would do differently. At best, you discuss skinny-ing one department (FEMA). But, situated in the midst of the section quoted above, you state: > [@](#): > > But my emphasis in this case would be on response, not prevention. My general assumption is that in most instances, somebody will screw something up sometime. Rather than attempt to prevent people from being people, I favor scrict liability, far-reaching accountability (including criminal sanctions). CEO’s may run a company into the ground or ignore safety laws if they think it will earn them a fatter paycheck, even if it destroys the company. They will think twice when the law says they go to jail, and their subordinates will have many more reasons to inform. This is hardly a blueprint for a smaller government – safety laws apparently still exist (who enforces them?) and you advocate expanding criminal liability. To be clear, it’s not that I “don’t like that [you’re] not some mythical ideologically pure mega-Libertarian.” It’s that I think you don’t understand the debate. When we speak about “small government” in this context, we’re not talking about trimming the fat from one administration’s budget. Generally we’re speaking about the government set up we have right now versus one with a stripped executive (basically a war department, a justice department, a department to oversee infrastructure and a collection arm). Sure, there is some middle in there, but, as suggested by the OP’s reference to proposals to eliminate the FDA, we’re talking about a government that is vastly smaller than the one we have now. ---
**Author:** ![gonzomax](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/e8c25b/32.png) [@gonzomax](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gonzomax)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2010, 2:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-small-no-government-solution-to-the-bp-spill/545868/34 "2010-07-09T02:39:38Z")
I don’t understand the fear of big government. Our corporations are huge and powerful. It takes a strong force to counterbalance the power they have assumed. We used to remove corporate charters from companies that did harm. Those days are long gone. We need more government regulation and oversight. We need stronger laws and more powerful arms of enforcement. We will have to go international to regulate and punish corporations. They are international and we will have to be too. A corporation could blow up an American city and claim we have no jurisdiction because they are incorporated in the Caymans. ---
**Author:** ![Magiver](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/4491bb/32.png) [@Magiver](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Magiver)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2010, 6:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-small-no-government-solution-to-the-bp-spill/545868/35 "2010-07-09T06:57:20Z")
> [@gonzomax](#): > > I don’t understand the fear of big government. Our corporations are huge and powerful. It takes a strong force to counterbalance the power they have assumed. We used to remove corporate charters from companies that did harm. Those days are long gone. We need more government regulation and oversight. We need stronger laws and more powerful arms of enforcement. > We will have to go international to regulate and punish corporations. They are international and we will have to be too. A corporation could blow up an American city and claim we have no jurisdiction because they are incorporated in the Caymans. “big” government is just an expression to denote excessive intrusion and wasteful spending of other people’s money. The desire to avoid that doesn’t negate the need for effective regulation. We had 2 houses of legislators which (when combined) promoted under-funded purchases of homes and underfunded financial instruments in the form of derivatives. One was used as a financial backup against the other. It was a house of cards that fell in on itself. We actually paid politicians to think this shit up. THAT’s big government. Instead of installing politicians based on actual job skills we vote them in as kings and queens as if it was a high school prom. BP was a singularly poor performer in the field of oil exploration. The rules and equipment were in place to do it right and they proceeded to reinvent the “F” in FUBAR. This would have been a swell place for government oversight and it wouldn’t have cost the tax payer a dime. BP should have been fined sufficiently to pay for on-sight engineers to verify their attempt to meet the standards all the other companies were able to live up to. Instead, they were in the running for a safety award. :smack: We did this to ourselves. ---
**Author:** ![gonzomax](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/e8c25b/32.png) [@gonzomax](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gonzomax)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2010, 2:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-small-no-government-solution-to-the-bp-spill/545868/36 "2010-07-09T14:43:30Z")
We are doing it again every day with mountain top removal and hydraulic fracturing. The relaxed standards are allowing gases and chemicals to pollute the water table. People near fracturing sites can ignite their tap water. The mining companies are bulldozing their waste into rivers. They are well aware of the damage they are doing. The regulation will come too late. it always does. There is a rhythm to regulation. After a disaster it gets far more stringent. Then the corporate lobbyists prod the politicians to relax the rules. As time fades the memories, we slowly believe the regulation has not saved us but that the process has become safe. This was the argument in the gulf. Many on this board declared gulf rig drilling to be absolutely foolproof. Even Obama was buying it and pressed for more wells. Now the country is paying for our lack of resolve and the purchasing of our politicians. What is going to change? Nothing. ---
**Author:** ![Ludovic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/7ab992/32.png) [@Ludovic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ludovic)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2010, 2:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-small-no-government-solution-to-the-bp-spill/545868/37 "2010-07-09T14:47:39Z")
> [@Magiver](#): > > We had 2 houses of legislators which (when combined) promoted under-funded purchases of homes and underfunded financial instruments in the form of derivatives. One was used as a financial backup against the other. It was a house of cards that fell in on itself. We actually paid politicians to think this shit up. THAT’s big government. The derivatives that were the prime mover in the collapse were barely regulated – much less so than other instruments. Moreover, repackaging of mortgages had been going on for decades before these new styles of derivatives showed up. They were absolutely not encouraged or created in any sense by Congress. The _lack of_ their regulation, not their encouragement, was the main reason for this crisis. It’s true that banks relied on them in order to repackage their loans – but by the time of the bubble, banks didn’t need encouragement at all from the law to finance risky loans. It’s not as if they would be on the hook if the risky borrowers failed – the poor schlub they sold the bad loan to (who didn’t know about the risk due to fraudulent rating) would be on the hook. If you took away all government encouragement to make widespread loans, all those bad loans would still have happened, because the ones who originated the loans didn’t have a stake in their long-term feasibility. ---
**Author:** ![sqweels](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/f19dbf/32.png) [@sqweels](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/sqweels)\ **Post date:** [July 13, 2010, 1:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-small-no-government-solution-to-the-bp-spill/545868/38 "2010-07-13T01:38:18Z")
What do we even mean by “small” government vs “big” government? A government with a large number of people working for it is one thing, a government with a lot of regulations and a lot of aggression in enforcing them is another. ---
**Author:** ![Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecccb3/32.png) [@Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skald_the_Rhymer)\ **Post date:** [July 15, 2010, 4:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-small-no-government-solution-to-the-bp-spill/545868/39 "2010-07-15T16:54:23Z")
> [@puddleglum](#): > > What agencies? The compensation comes from tort law. And there’s no reason to think a multi-zillion dollar corporation might have a slight advantage in court and decide to simply outlast the plantiffs. ---
**Author:** ![gonzomax](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/e8c25b/32.png) [@gonzomax](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gonzomax)\ **Post date:** [July 16, 2010, 6:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-small-no-government-solution-to-the-bp-spill/545868/40 "2010-07-16T18:05:38Z")
> [@Skald\_the\_Rhymer](#): > > And there’s no reason to think a multi-zillion dollar corporation might have a slight advantage in court and decide to simply outlast the plantiffs. The Exon Valdez settlement was cut over and over in court appeals until the final payment was at about 10 percent of the original reward. Obama has not even broomed the right wing judges that Bush appointed. The powerful corporations own the whole system. You are screwed in the courts. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-small-no-government-solution-to-the-bp-spill/545868.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-small-no-government-solution-to-the-bp-spill/545868.md?page=3)