A Tesla Cybertruck driver was killed in what appears to be the first reported fatal crash involving the electric pickup truck, which has yet to undergo third-party crash testing.
You’re getting downvoted but people REALLY don’t understand the field of regulation. How many regulators do people think exist? Compare that with the number of engineers and technicians designing building and testing cars at the OEMs? Do you think these people can get 100% validation? Do you think there is budget or appetite to achieve this level of regulation?
It’s not even a desirable goal. Do you think every batch of food and agricultural goods that is manufactured or imported is 100% inspected? How feasible do you think that is?
The point is regulators are generally able to use sound statistical methods to obtain excellent levels of public safety with TINY budgets. Sure, more would be better, but it will never be necessary to get close 100% coverage simply because most humans WANT to make a quality product and most manufacturers… at least have a brand to protect in terms of not killing anyone.
Nobody is asking for 100% coverage, that’s a strawperson argument. We just want someone in the process to have two things 1) the public interest 2) authority to do something.
Engineers and technicians are servants. Capitalists are in charge and they’d poor mercury down and infant’s throat for a dollar. This idea that we should rely on good actors in the system is just another version of “trust us bro”.
I get your sentiment, certainly. When regulations work well they protect engineers and technicians from the pressure to cut corners to save money. That’s hard work that can only be done by well funded and fully empowered regulatory bodies something that’s unfortunately become a political issue and is being actively undermined.
That being said I’ve been on both sides of the engineer-regulator relationship and I’ve rarely been in a “trust us bro” situation. Both sides want a safe, high quality product. When regulators work well, they can definitely protect engineers from capitalist pressure. Being able to say “sorry, I know it’s expensive, but we have to do it or we won’t get certified” is worth its weight in gold when you’re trying to design a good, safe product!
So we do what conservatives keep telling us works for everything, privatize it.
Regulations should be made to require all models be tested by a 3rd party that is not a government agency or government funded. If some schmuck wants to sell something potentially dangerous, it’s on them to foot the bill proving it’s not dangerous. They stand to benefit from the sales, it shouldn’t be on the public anyway to be paying for that.
Public safety should be managed by public entities, not private. That’s a blatant conflict of interest and I’m not a fan whatsoever.
Some things can sometimes work well, like when the regulation is publicly managed but privately tested using straightforward methods. UL does decent work here, but the profit incentive on both sides creates a nasty conflict of interest and puts pressure on engineers and technicians that compromises their work and integrity.
There is nothing fundamentally broken about our regulatory system except politics. If the funding stops getting cut and politicians stop gutting regulatory bodies’ ability to interpret and enforce regulations there won’t be a problem.
Regulators in general care about their work, care about public safety, and use sound statistical approaches to getting the best bang for the taxpayer and corporate dollar. Keeping private profit out of the equation means costs are low and companies aren’t at a competitive disadvantage internationally.
