"I suspect the point is that if the only group which is in any way meaningfully enriched are the lawyers, there is a problem we should be examining in the underlying system.
"
Yes, and probably stop enriching anyone.
But again, i could argue literally the same thing about startups or anything else HN cares about, and it makes about as much sense (since you haven't said "why" this makes sense)
IE i could say:
"if the only group of people meaningfully enriched are early startup employees, there is a problem we should be examining in the underlying system".
You act as if the problem is the lawyers here. Much like crappy startups, the lawyers are just doing what clients are quite literally paying them to do. The underlying problem is the people who think this is their ticket to money.
Until you solve that cultural problem, you won't get anywhere. Without people trying to sue over everything and believing they are entitled to mondo bucks because their coffee maker failed one morning or whatever, you would have no problem whatsoever.
But right now we've built a system of private enforcement. That's ... what the lawyers do. and they take the cases likely to actually be good for business.
If you want a different system, you'd also have to change the enforcement mechanism.
"...A system lobbied for, and legislated by said lawyers."
What?
You realize there are lawyers lobbying on both sides of this, right?
They both spend and lobby about equal amounts, too. You see the same thing in criminal law as well.