We don't sell fireworks nor guns to children. (At least, in the UK we don't).
The magnet companies sold these items as a toy to children and resisted efforts to put warnings on them and resisted efforts to stop them being sold to children.
The magnet companies sold these items as a toy to children and resisted efforts to put warnings on them and resisted efforts to stop them being sold to children.
That's categorically false.
No it's not. This submission is about one company resisting the regulatory action created when buckyballs continued to sell the product to 14 year olds, even though they knew teenagers were among the > 1000 children hospitalised by these magnets.
Are you really trying to argue that a 14 year old is so overcome by the overwhelming desire to experience magnetic forces that s/he is unable to read a warning label, and the only sensible course of action is to halt all sales of the product? Come off it.
The warnings you talk about on buckyballs did not say "adults only", they said "13+".
It is dishonest to suggest that buckyballs didn't sell to children and to say that buckyballs included warnings about not selling to children when the warnings said 13+.
> Are you really trying to argue that a 14 year old is so overcome by the overwhelming desire to experience magnetic forces that s/he is unable to read a warning label
That's what happened, yes. Children are by definition fucking idiots. That's why we don't let them drive; drink alcohol; vote; run for office; enter into contracts; join the military; live by themselves; get married; have sex; etc.
>, and the only sensible course of action is to halt all sales of the product? Come off it.
I'm saying we tried warning labels. Parents and children and toy stores ignored those warnings, and children ended up hospitalised as a result. The manufacturers resisted attempts to strengthen the warnings; regulators were forced into issuing a ban because soft-touch regulation failed.
The manufacturers brought this upon themselves by not controlling their supply chain properly and by resisting better clearer warnings.
If you are telling me that a 13 year old can't comprehend a clearly written warning then I call bullshit. If parents and children and toy stores ignore the warnings then the responsibility lies with them, not the manufacturers. I am not willing to live in a society where everything has to be dumbed down to the level of safety for a small child.
The manufacturers brought this upon themselves by not controlling their supply chain properly and by resisting better clearer warnings.
What does the supply chain have to do with consumer behavior? Total bullshit. Why don't you think that parents, toy stores and older children are immune from responsibility when they are given clear warnings of the danger? I take responsibility for myself and any kids that are temporarily in my care, so you should you and so should everyone else.
You're literally arguing that adults should be able to have nice things because some people are too fucking stupid to follow directions. No. Once they've been properly informed and still choose to do stupid shit, it's their responsibility, not mine or yours. Why are you arguing so intently for treating everyone like children just because some adults refuse to accept responsibility?
I am not sure where you got the idea that the companies were trying to sell these thing to children. They never attempted to do that, and if they had they would be liable for millions in damages. They did everything they could to save their business and cooperated with the CPSC in every possible way.
Disclaimer: I am not directly involved with these companies but I am a freelancer who built and ran the Buckyballs website for almost four years.
This was the first court case CPSC took in 13 years to force a recall. That doesn't sound like an out of control regulator.
Regulators & regulations aren't an unmitigated good. They can be better than their lack, or they can be worse.
If we can't sell things to adults because they're dangerous to children, we might as well close... well, all hardware stores.
My nephews don't think tools or random bits of hardware are uninteresting. I certainly didn't either. If you're of a mind to play, the world is nothing but toys.
The regulator's point about the magnets is that the manufacturers didn't manage to stop them being sold in toy shops to children, and that even with the warnings parents were giving them to children as toys.
And, even compared to random bits of hardware store: if you swallow a nail you're probably going to be ok. If you swallow magnets you're probably going to need medical help.
As long as you're okay with sepsis from a perforated intestine, then sure.
If a child swallows anything larger than a dime, the standard recommendation is to seek medical attention.
Most small boys (and some girls) are fascinated by tools, that's why there are play tools in toy stores so kids can pretend to be a construction worker or suchlike. Conversely I enjoy playing with magnets but I also find them useful for visualizing complex problems and as artistic tools for texturing paint.
Maybe you didn't find physical tools interesting as a child but it's fallacious to assume that no other children do when there's abundant evidence to the contrary.
The first warning label on Buckyballs said 13+. Anyone under 18 is a child.
The facts fall staunchly in opposition to your comments suggesting that they were resistant to applying warning labels, and actively trying to market them to children. This is why all of your comments stating such are downvoted into the grey. One of your other comments claims all the CPSC wanted was warnings, but the reality is that the CPSC worked to drive these companies out of business after all of the warnings were present.
And if your child (Lets say over the age of 3) is still eating random non-food items without checking with you, then you're not doing a great parenting job.
Don't you think the whole "put a warning sticker on everything" is getting a bit ridiculous?
If you spend a little bit of time thinking about how strong magnets can probably attract each other through internal tissue, the risk makes sense, but it doesn't seem like something that's obvious, at least not to me.
This is one circumstance where awareness/warning labels are really useful, but unfortunately we hear so many frivolous warnings people are not likely to take them seriously. Everyone should know that these contraptions were literally banned at one point for the risk they pose to children, and the disclaimers encountered are not just generic CYA, but representative of a real risk to small children that has a real body count.
Like the GP, I'm glad that these are legal in the United States again, but we should not take the issue of informing parents of the risk involved with these toy-like objects lightly.
A similar issue is being posed by the small watch batteries included in many children's toys and remote controls these days. Children swallow these and they burn holes in their organs that result in serious disabilities. It's important that parents be aware of such non-obvious environmental dangers.
I don't think non-clever parents ought to be punished via their children. That seems a little Old Testament biblical.
> Don't you think the whole "put a warning sticker on everything" is getting a bit ridiculous?
That's pretty good late 90's standup material, but I'm not sure if it's factually supported. Are there too many stickers? Are they effective or not effective at preventing harm? Do they incur more costs than the harm they prevent?
So yes, I think we've gone too far.
I argue that there are too many stickers, that they become less effective through profusion, and that in some cases the cost does exceed the benefit. For example, in California a 1986 ballot initiative called Proposition 65 mandates that businesses put up a sign on any building that contains chemicals known to the state of California to cause cancer. Unfortunately this definition is very vague, since many common chemicals can be carcinogenic in sufficient quantities. As a result, virtually every business in California displays a sign warning that the building contains cancer-causing chemicals, completely obviating the utility of warning the public about hazards because it's impossible to distinguish what the actual level of risk is. There doesn't seem to be any evidence of the signage provision actually helping in any way, but it's been a goldmine for signmakers and attorneys who file nuisance lawsuits over the non-display of these useless signs: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_Proposition_65_(198...
Note that I'm not arguing against regulation here, I'm arguing against ineffectual regulation whose discernable costs exceed the discernable benefit.
That's just plain ridiculous. No amount or quality of parenting will prevent a child from occasionally doing something stupid, any more than it will prevent an adult from the same.
Please stop offering false dichotomies like 'status quo (even when it's failing) or no regulation at all.'
as opposed to your slippery-slope "where does it end?" argument?
Unless you think that there should be no regulations at all, you agree that there is some line before which there should be regulations and after it there shouldn't, so "where does it end" is an actual discussion to have, not a non-sequitor to end the conversation like you're using it.
It was not a non-sequitur at all. I want an answer.
Meantime, since we are already having that debate, I am asking you, personally, to go on the record on where you as an individual think that line of demarcation should be. I am all for safety labeling (up to the point where there are so many safety warnings that their effectiveness drops) but I am also all for people being able to buy potentially dangerous products that can be used safely by following instructions and the use of the senses by a person of ordinary adult competence.
In other words, if a supermajority of adults selected via a statistically valid sampling method were to examine a commercial product and correctly infer what degree of danger it might present (based on the packaging, direct observation of the product, and general knowledge) then that's Good Enough.
I don't think that we need to build all our theories of product safety and liability around the least competent people in our society. That imposes a large opportunity cost on people who do take their responsibilities seriously but whose liberty is curtailed in the name of safeguarding people who can't or won't take responsibility.
These magnets hospitalised over a thousand children, and killed at least one.
How many children are hospitalized/die from swallowing coins or lego?
Do we need warning labels on coins?
How many kids are hospitalized/die from swallowing batteries? I'd bet it's a lot more than magnets, and batteries can be pretty lethal.
For button batteries:
poison.org[1] lists 54 fatalities since 1977; the Children's Hospital of Philadelphia has a page [2] that mentions "Fifteen children have died — 11 of them within the last six years" but it isn't clear when exactly that page was published.
[1]http://www.poison.org/battery/fatalcases
[2] http://www.chop.edu/centers-programs/kohls-injury-prevention...
However that doesn't help us much. Strong magnets are far more prevalent now and the specific toys that caused most injuries weren't around in the UK, I think (?), back then.
Moreover, that probably makes magnet injuries per item in the home massively outweigh coin injuries.
I looked for EU IDB stats too but didn't get anywhere, my starting source was http://www.rospa.com/resources/statistics/ which lists some other potential data sources at the bottom.
Of course you can't prevent every idiot from doing something stupid. But some things are dangerous in an non-obvious way. It's pretty obvious you can choke on small objects. It's not obvious that eating one small magnet is fine, but eating a second one after a while can kill you.
This is just not true. I bought a lot of Buckyballs (a brand of magnet) before they were taken off sale and they had very clear and prominent warnings on them which I read and took seriously because I am an adult. Neither I nor the manufacturer are responsible for people who won't do that.
Now maybe you can cite a manufacturer in the UK who showed disregard for such regulation, but we're talking about a regulatory body in the US which insisted on taking products off sale even though the manufacturers were fully compliant with the regulatory demands. Please stick within the factual context.
Magnet companies are more likely to care about their customers than government caring about my child.
> We don't sell fireworks nor guns to children.
UK is not a good example because they dont even sell hardware tools to kids. That is simply wussyfication of the society.
...mostly by regulation, right?
I mean – we can all hope that all parent read about all accidents that kill people and then independently come to the smart conclusion, including a level-headed appreciation of the risk, normalized within the background context and the market penetration of ultra-strong magnets...
or – better idea – let's put some smart people in a room and let them make a recommendation.
There's even a staunchly capitalistic argument for regulation: it's the only reason we trust food from a supermarket we've never visited before, or a new toy, or an online bank, or a really fast looking electric car from California made by this guy who mostly deals in explosions controlled by 400,000 mechanical parts all supplied by the lowest bidder.
In other words: Regulation creates the trust that's essential for any economic activity.
Mostly by bad reviews, lawsuites and bad PR. One good example of this is https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thalidomide
While everyone thinks that it was an evil pharma that should have stopped by regulators it appears that the pharma company lost billions but saved by regulators instead.
>we can all hope that all parent read about all accidents that kill people and then independently come to the smart conclusion
Neither parent not bureaucrats can do that 100% correctly. Parents can do it infinitely better that the people in washington. Babies will die no matter what.
> let's put some smart people in a room and let them make a recommendation.
Like smart people deciding on housing loans, student loans, cheaper healthcare, invasion of Iraq ? It eventually snowballs into a giant problem that makes the original problem far less worse.
Smart people do not possess the intelligence or information to make decisions for others.
To quite the Wikipedia article you linked:
For correctly denying the application despite the
pressure from Richardson-Merrell, Kelsey eventually
received the President's Award for Distinguished
Federal Civilian Service at a 1962 ceremony with
President John F. Kennedy. In September 2010, the
FDA honored Kelsey with the first Kelsey award.
The award, given annually to an FDA staff member,
came 50 years after Kelsey, then a new medical
officer at the agency, first reviewed the application
from the William S. Merrell Company of Cincinnati.[109]
Cardiologist Helen B. Taussig learned of the damaging
effects of the drug thalidomide on newborns and in 1967,
testified before Congress on this matter after a trip to
Germany where she worked with infants with
phocomelia (severe limb deformities).
As a result of her efforts, thalidomide was banned
in the United States and Europe.
Meanwhile, in places where the market was regulating itself:
Throughout the world, about 10,000 cases were
reported of infants with phocomelia due to
thalidomide; only 50% of the 10,000 survived.FDA saved people from Thalidomide ? What about over 100K people who lost their life because FDA delayed approval of Provenge and many other life saving drugs ? What about the near monopoly that FDA has granted to EpiPens ? What about millions of Americans who can afford basic healthcare because of FDA's compliance costs and die as a result ?
Just for sample check this : http://www.lifeextension.com/magazine/2010/11/FDA-Delay-of-O...
FDA or market based regulation totally depends on the outcomes and at least for me it is very apparent that market is extremely good at figuring out what works and what not than FDA. Also at significantly lower costs.
>Throughout the world, about 10,000 cases were reported of infants with phocomelia due to thalidomide; only 50% of the 10,000 survived.
It is actually a very good example of how quickly market can detect signals and respond to it. FDA in this case is purely awarded for being slow. FDA has a very poor history of preventing harmful drugs one has to only look at the list of lawsuites after which the drugs ere taken back from market.
At the moment that seems completely false to me. I don't remember a single time I took any government regulation seriously. For example I take my mechanic's advice about car safety far more seriously than government reports and ratings.
I trust Yelp lot more to chose a doctor for my kid than any government report. Honestly, I dont even care if the doctor actually had a medical degree or not if the yelp reviews and my peer's reviews about that doctor are good enough.
Regulator's role in deceiving public on important issues on the contrary makes me fare more skeptical. Regulator's stand on marijuana, vaping, sugar, fat, mother's milk, ethanol in gas and many others things is often false.
Why? Your mechanic might have useful insight into the reliability of cars but would have little more visibility into the safety of cars than the average person.
> Honestly, I dont even care if the doctor actually had a medical degree or not if the yelp reviews and my peer's reviews about that doctor are good enough.
I hope your kid is a rhetorical device and not an actual child.
On the contrary he knows more people in real accidents unlike the regulators and sees on regular basis which car did better and worse. He has a clear skin in the game to offer me reliable advice.
> I hope your kid is a rhetorical device and not an actual child.
It is a rhetorical device but I hardly doubt people demand to see their pediatrician's degree certificate.
Most people don't demand to see the pediatrician's degree and certifications because the government regulates the industry.
> Most people don't demand to see the pediatrician's degree and certifications because the government regulates the industry.
People refer to yelp, friends and other known patients before visiting a doctor. Or they rely on a reputable brand of the hospital which has all the incentive to employ good doctors. Government regulation or not people do not rely on mere certificate the doctor has and instead rely on other much more collaborative system to figure out who is a good doctor.
In the absence of government's heavy handed approach of medical regulation the market can perhaps develop a FICO like score for doctors.
Daily life must be fascinating. All these miracles – wireless phones, glowing globes, flying(like off the ground!). Experts are completely useless, so these things must be spiritual creatures, created for the pleasure of "street-smart" people.
I wish there were a way for such people to actually opt out the system they reject.
Not one of that invention you list is made by experts working to help people. On the contrary they are a result of spontaneous order created by people pursuing self interest.
It's healthy to be skeptical of the government. It's not healthy to always assume malice, because it makes you so biased that you do things like assume your mechanic knows more about the safety of cars than the people whose only job is to determine the safety of cars.
Your mechanic has zero skin in the car safety game. He has nothing to gain or lose from giving accurate safety advice. This means he's not financially incentivized to push certain cars but also means he's not incentivized to gather or provide accurate or useful data.
I'm amazed that you're so distrustful of the government that you prefer tarot reading from your mechanic over the recommendations from the agency that literally crashes thousands of cars to gather data on how safe they are. This isn't healthy skepticism. This is blind hate.
> People refer to yelp, friends and other known patients before visiting a doctor.
People generally have no way of knowing the quality of a doctor. They recommend primarily based on whether they like the doctor on a personal level. Which is fine because the medical industry is structured to largely keep incompetent doctors out.
> In the absence of government's heavy handed approach of medical regulation the market can perhaps develop a FICO like score for doctors.
I'm just kind of at a loss here. FICO was such a screwed up system that the government had to step in and regulate it because people were unable to get loans because of bad data and they had no way to find out or fix it. This is hardly a good model for controlling quality in general.
When industries form bodies to self-regulate in the absence of government involvement, it generally doesn't help consumers. It helps the industry. It's also typically called collusion because it's such a harmful practice.
Well then you're just a foolish person. The absurdity of some regulations doesn't mean that all regulations are absurd - that's a simple fallacy of composition.
I dont even care if the doctor actually had a medical degree or not if the yelp reviews and my peer's reviews about that doctor are good enough.
Yeah sure buddy. Come over next time you have a bad pain and I'll operate for cheap. I have a really high karma score so you know I'm legit.
Profitability does not automatically imply liability...unless you want all manufacturers to carry total liability insurance for every product they sell and for every product to become significantly more expensive as a result.