The Inexplicable War on Lemonade Stands
forbes.com
forbes.com
They know it's a hassle to go after people who are wealthy and can afford their own lawyers so they avoid it unless there is something political to be gained.
This theme repeats itself at every level, local, state and federal.
This is why when I see things like a national database for facial recognition it's pretty easy to accurately predict for every one "terrorist" caught each decade, thousands of people will experience life-traumatizing hassle that they didn't deserve.
Just look at the TSA and their VIPR "squad" - if they are not defunded soon, they will become the nightmare of the USA, never catching one "terrorist" but themselves terrorizing millions of citizens for no purpose but to "keep us in our place".
I think we will really get a demonstration of this at the upcoming RNC and DNC conventions (ironically funded by taxpayers).
Since there are no border customs checks any more in Schengen area, the customs officers have authority to stop any vehicle and to strip it bare, while searching for a cause for an investigation.
In Slovenia as of this year, customs officers are allowed on private land to perform an inspection of fuel for vehicles (heating oil is basically diesel with lower tax and often used in heavy and farm machinery).
What VIPR is doing now is grabbing people as they LEAVE trains and putting them through mock-airport security (yes as they leave, not before).
They also stop people on the road and question them "where are you coming from, where are you going". I am not sure about the various countries in Europe but in the USA, until this decade, police were supposed to have "probable cause" to stop and question you.
This is why it's freaking people out. And I am pretty sure it's meant to. Holiday travel is only a month away and the groping starts up then, so the media will finally pay attention but it never goes anywhere near getting the TSA defunded.
Sadly, the freedoms lost because of these events set back the Unites States many many decades. I remember growing up a proud US citizen who was happy to be patriotic because my country stood for the right things for the right reasons.
Now, I'm ashamed. My country took a head first dive into the quick sand of ignorance and fear even though there were countless, larger than life, signs warning us it was right there.
To my fellow citizen, and the rest of the word, I'm sorry America is no longer the beacon of freedom it once was.
I don't think terrorists actually win. What they got on 9/11 is more intervention in the middle east. The fact that it terrify the US government into terrorizing their own citizen is just incidental.
The additional intervention in the middle east was a given either way so I don't think that can be looked at as a loss for them.
Getting the US out of the Middle East is a long-term goal of Al Qaeda and similar organizations. But the short-term goal, i.e., how they plan to get us out of the Middle East, is by causing our society to collapse -- financially and socially. To paraphrase one of OBL's treatises, Al Qaeda wants to "bleed" us to death. Terror is their chief tactic in pursuit of that strategy.
OBL is dead, and depending on whom you ask, Al Qaeda is either spent or significantly weakened. But that's sort of beside the point. Those guys never really expected that 9/11 would cause us to withdraw immediately from the Middle East. In fact, their entire plan was to draw us deeper in, where we could waste blood and treasure and engender further ill will in the region. And the fact that we whipped up a security frenzy in our own country (PATRIOT act, airport security theater, paranoia, etc.)? That's either icing on the cake, or part of the cake itself, but it's certainly a big win in Al Qaeda's column.
Now, if you take the long view, you could argue that there's still time for us to correct our course. The terror and repurcussions of our reaction to 9/11 can still be undone. We recovered from McCarthyism. We recovered from the Alien & Sedition Acts. Time and again, our country has temporarily threatened its own principles or abandoned rationality, and then come back to its senses in the long run. It's entirely possible that the post-9/11 security frenzy ends up being another historical footnote.
Of course, it was not rational in the long run. But for the careers of certain individuals, it is a good thing. The harm may be so dispersed that they barely felt it or they are shielded from it altogether. Furthermore, they are fueled by our irrationality of perceiving rare, media-worthy like a terrorist attack as more important than many common death scenarios and the more common(and arguably more important) horror.
Keep in mind that organizations will either choose to expand, or disappears. If the US government choose the rational way for society and enlightened self-interest, it would have make itself disappear by unemploying themselves in the process. Of course, the government choose to makes job for the insider instead.
In some sense, this is what the party of the US government wanted and what terrorists desire. But if they aren't so wrapped up in the government or being a terrorist, they might have a different perspective.
It's like being a luddite at the dawn of the industrial revolution. We saw that we are losing our jobs, but we don't see that eventually our quality of life is going to increase. Now that we don't have to make clothes, we can enjoy the finer thing in life.
http://www.tnr.com/article/politics/rhetorical-question
In 1994, his bill was considered too extreme and heavily criticized for not protecting civil liberties.
Yes, terrorists have long won in USA.
You also can't say they've never caught a terrorist. There have been many stories on the news in the past couple of years about the TSA catching potential terrorists.
It reminds me of all the Y2K people that said: "See, nothing happened. Everything was fine!" When 1000s of man hours went into preventing computer problems.
"terrorizing millions of citizens"
I suppose your definition of terrorism includes checking your shoes and belongings for contraband. I've flown a lot in the last couple of years and the security is a pain-in-the-ass, but necessary. I would rather be safe in this situation. The US has many enemies.
We'd be safer without the theater because we'd know what was going on.
Also, the freedoms we lose to this useless security aren't worth the trade-off. They wouldn't be even if the security worked, let alone with it being unworkable and counter-productive.
Show me an attack that's happened in the last 10 years.
"it's meant to pacify people like you"
I feel like you are on the side of the terrorists. If not, they love people like you. You fight for your right to have more security holes in our system.
As a developer, it would be like saying that I want to fight for no firewall and updates because it slows down the process of development and makes things to complicated.
"But the security isn't necessary. It doesn't stop trivial attacks we could come up with on here, and it's not meant to, it's meant to pacify people like you who demand SOMETHING be done."
How do you know? It's not like you can go back in time and change security to see if we have less attacks.
"Also, the freedoms we lose to this useless security aren't worth the trade-off. They wouldn't be even if the security worked, let alone with it being unworkable and counter-productive."
Okay, so if we do take all the security precautions away and there are attacks, can we hold you (and everyone that wants this) personally responsible?
It's kind of like when I've argued with ex-girlfriends in the past: They keep fighting and fighting on a certain subject..I let them see the error of their ways (usually with bad consequences)..and in the end, I get blamed anyway.
If the error means any deaths, I don't want to take that chance to show you I'm right. I would imagine you would then still blame the US government instead for their foreign policy.
It's not useless security and it's very selfish of you to demand less security simply because you are inconvenienced. yes it means a little less freedom, but it's for your own good.
It was an unsuccessful attack, but that was due to his incompetence more than any security measures that were in place.
There was also Richard Reid the "Shoe Bomber". He falls into the "last 10 years" but arguably is the reason we have to take our shoes off now.
I'm shocked at all the anti-security people here on HN. Do you also have no password on you wireless connection and pay for goods online with no SSL?
I would really like to see if the people downvoting have any security precautions in place in their daily lives. If so, they are a little hypocritical.
Only by your misconceptions of useful security, and how it can be cobble together from unrelated and broken parts.
> Do you also have no password on you wireless connection
Of course I don't have a password on my wireless. Otherwise how could anyone who needed a connection use it? Sheesh.
The only reason to fear someone on your LAN is because you aren't secure. If you job involves deploying anything Internet facing you can't rely on a firewall to keep the bad people away.
>I would really like to see if the people downvoting have any security precautions in place in their daily lives.
Of course we do. I look both ways before crossing the street, I don't burn candles unattended, I fix all visible "broken windows", and I don't use any measures that don't offer at least a fair bit of protection in the given context. Weak layers are a distraction and a problem, to you.
> If so, they are a little hypocritical.
Not at all. You'd probably (hopefully) object if I came to your house and replaced your smoke detector with a unicorn detector and a bad-stuff detector, even though you now had twice the number of security devices as before.
If you understand why you'd object to those you'll start to understand why I object to what you see as security measures.
> ..and if we had no security, would it be any better?
YES!
Than fake security, I mean.
If we had no security we'd know it and we wouldn't take pictures we didn't want seen, or write email we didn't want read. A realistic view is always preferable.
When enough people use your wireless connection and you get slapped with an IP letter for your ISP, you will realize the error of your ways.
"The only reason to fear someone on your LAN is because you aren't secure. If you job involves deploying anything Internet facing you can't rely on a firewall to keep the bad people away."
Yet, you still take security precautions. A firewall was just a example of taking a security precaution.
"even though you now had twice the number of security devices as before."
Is this a joke?
"Than fake security, I mean."
I'm still not quite sure what this "real security" is as opposed to "fake security" that we have now..and I don't think you do either. You haven't brought up one point.
You haven't seen one point...
Airline security taking the plate away from the person when they could just buy another plate down the hall and carry it onto the same airplane. That's fake security.
As is anything that purports to offer a benefit but that in examination, does not, or where the "benefit" isn't for some reason.
>> "even though you now had twice the number of security devices as before."
> Is this a joke?
People have been asking themselves that about your posts.
But no, it was not. It's a serious example of how you recognize fake security, and reject it, at one level but not at another because it's out of your league. But you don't recognize this and presume to lecture those who understand more than you.
> Yet, you still take security precautions. A firewall was just a example of taking a security precaution.
I take actual precautions. I don't have a rabbit's foot, four-leafed clover, or the like.
> When enough people use your wireless connection and you get slapped with an IP letter for your ISP, you will realize the error of your ways.
All you authoritarians speak is pain, and you LIKE it. You're just cackling with glee waiting for me to be hauled away.
BTW, traffic from my LAN doesn't have to reach the Internet anywhere 'near' me. No, I appear to be a mild-mannered business. One day a misaddressed and ultimately unjust takedown will ruin your month though and you'll have only yourself and your millions of rabid and vapid brethren to thank.
I happen to strongly disagree with your position, but I'm happy to read what you said and consider it.
I just find that freedom (as a value) trumps security... I mean, none of us are - afaik - planning to live forever, and I personally don't consider a life to be worth living unless it can be lived free from oppression. Life in a country that values freedom and liberty as core principles is dangerous... ok, we get it. And more than a few of us are quite happy with that state of affairs.
This is all also, of course, ignoring that most of what passes for "enhancing security" today is really just "security theatre" that isn't doing a damn thing to actually make anybody any safer.
And of course you're just as blind to the consequences here as with airline security. You'd sell out everyone else's right to have a say, for the flawed representative democracy we have, without even ensuring it'd even listen to you.
If you suddenly noticed a real flaw and wanted it addressed you'd find yourself just as ignored by the system as we are by you.
Those who would give up Essential Liberty
to purchase a little Temporary Safety,
deserve neither Liberty nor Safety.
Anyway, be happy because a majority in the US believes in the same bullshit that you do.
Yes, I down-voted you. Mostly because you're a zealot that just repeats the gospel you saw on TV and when reading such opinions (stated as facts nonetheless) makes me lose faith in humanity a little.
Polarization and framing: you (and the TSA and media) have presented an amalgamation of various half-baked ideas, thrown them in a bag with some actual proven ideas, and slapped a big "security" label on it. It's impossible to have a productive discussion if you're using overly broad terminology, or defining words differently. Then, you turn it into a binary debate by labeling those who disagree with your particular brand of "security" as "anti-security." Start by defining, in terms of the intended result and means to get there, exactly what you mean by "security," and don't lump all kinds of "security" together under one label.
Trolling: since this type of conversation almost invariably produces back and forth arguments between people thinking, "If only they read my own unique perspective, maybe they'll finally understand." The first word that pops into my mind when someone starts this kind of conversation is troll. You know that most of HN is vocally opposed to the kind of child-groping security theater the TSA is practicing, so you might be better received if you tried to explain your security goals in ways that appeal to that audience. For example, give us solid metrics that were decided upon before a new security measure was enacted, demonstrably correlate to actual crime, improve after the measure is implemented, and don't cause undue burden on freedom or the economy (where by "undue" I mean cost more in time, money, or liberty than the time, money, or liberty gained by implementing the measure).
It's not your right to take my freedom so you can feel a little safer. Freedom trumps safety, that's why we have a constitution, to define the freedoms you can't take for any reason, including safety. You should read the fourth amendment sometime, it was written specifically to stop people like you from using the absurd arguments you're now using to take my freedom.
You aren't looking to plug any holes, just place a big flag in front of them and declare them handled. You want security theater the way you want a kiss from mom, to make you feel safe because the monsters under the bed are beyond your comprehension.
> I feel like you are on the side of the terrorists. If not, they love people like you.
I know you won't hear this, but hopefully someone like you and not emotionally invested in this will.
Things I do may actually decrease the number of threats in the world, or their severity. Thing you advocate for will only make things worse by ignoring real holes pointed out by real experts.
Not only is your knee-jerk security-over-freedom response and increase military spending exactly what the terrorists want (they broke the USSR doing this, they're well on their way to taking out the USA with the same system.) but by focusing on band-aids for the current manifestation of terrorism instead of real fixes you're the one creating not only the biggest public-works boondoggle ever, but one totally incapable of stopping attacks.
> If the error means any deaths, I don't want to take that chance to show you I'm right.
Of course not. You've misidentified and overblown a risk and you wouldn't want to stop harping on it, even if it's far less likely than things you could do something about.
> I would imagine you would then still blame the US government instead for their foreign policy.
Well, duh. Canada and Sweden aren't as hated.
But you throw this out there only to straw-man it, when it's the truth that you're allergic to. Other people are as smart as we are and if we humiliate and kill them they're going to do the same to us.
If you could clean up the crack problem in your town you'd cut down on theft far more than by buying everyone better locks. Because then the thieves would just break windows, mug people, do knock-invasions, etc.
You're pissing off (killing family and friends of) people with just as much drive and intellect as us here on HN and some of them are putting every minute of free time into literally devising way to kill smug first-world twits like yourself who sit around and act all paranoid about a 1/1M chance of dying in terrorism while your armed forces kill 1/150 Iraqis. Until you wake up you are going to be creating smart and dedicated enemies who will stop at nothing to ruin you - if only because it's the only way to get you to stop.
But I'm sure you'll just write this off as "Blaming the USA".
> How do you know? It's not like you can go back in time and change security to see if we have less attacks.
Because any decent geek can invent three ways to slip a weapon (a sharp edge, a thin poker, a tazer, incapacitating spray, etc) onto a plane. I've seen security confiscate collectible plates from someone, provide them with a stern lecture of the risks (which apparently include unarmed terrorist who fly speculatively, hoping to acquire a knitting needle, or plate shard from a fellow passenger), and send the hapless tourist on their way. Then, in the secure area of the terminal just 20m away, are stores selling virtually identical plates.
Obviously taking that plate did nothing except perhaps create a disgruntled person potentially willing to cause problems.
> Okay, so if we do take all the security precautions away and there are attacks, can we hold you (and everyone that wants this) personally responsible?
Sure. If we can hold you responsible for all the deaths that happened because we spent money on the DHS and the TSA instead of more ambulances and doctors. And the deaths caused by your armed forces (well over a million in the last ten years) in retribution for the attacks of an unrelated group on you.
> I let them see the error of their ways (usually with bad consequences).
Are you always this right about it?
> It's not useless security and it's very selfish of you to demand less security simply because you are inconvenienced. yes it means a little less freedom, but it's for your own good.
No, it is worthless security because it doesn't make us more secure. Because of that it's not for my good. So all the inconvenience is not only wasted, it's spent on a pointless and thuggish bureaucracy which breeds complacent followers so accustomed to being ordered around by armed officers they don't realize this isn't the USA once was.
> As a developer, it would be like saying that I want to fight for no firewall and updates because it slows down the process of development and makes things to complicated.
No, as a developer it would be like saying, "I don't care how many layers of ROTn you use, it doesn't provide any security."
I think it'd be perfectly reasonable to say that as a developer, and that it's especially reasonable to present my opinions on physical security too because I'm not only a consumer of society, but I pay for my piece of it and want to get something worthwhile.
"I have a rock here that keeps tigers away."
"What? That's crazy talk."
"Well, you don't see any tigers around do ya?"
Not to mention, based on what we know of terrorists caught plotting against the Western world in the past decade, nearly all were discovered by intelligence networks (i.e. the CIA/NSA), not checkpoint searches. In fact, at least one incident passed security just fine but relied on quick-thinking passengers to subdue to the terrorist.
Useless indeed.
After September 11, I personally wrote a letter to the Middle East telling them to knock it off. You're welcome.
Or, in more words: "No attacks have occurred" is not sufficient evidence for the efficacy of TSA and co. A similar argument can, after all, be made for the efficacy of any other absurd measure—and unlike my angry letter, the TSA, as well as its equivalents in other countries (some of which HAVE had attacks) has been repeatedly demonstrated to be incompetent and ineffective.
> I feel like you are on the side of the terrorists.
Calling anybody who questions political power-grabbing a terrorist is absurd. Details of this particular instance aside, we should always be able to question and scrutinize this sort of action. If not, then there will be very little left of democracy.
Off the top of my head, there was that incident at LAX where some guys shot up the El Al ticket counter, another shooting rampage at Fort Hood, and a third at the DC Holocaust Museum. I believe that more can be found if one were to look, I'm just doing this from memory.
Your statement that security in the US is high is absurd. There are so many holes that it's ridiculous. We're protecting certain things, but ignoring others. If somebody wants to create terror in the US, it would be trivial to blow up an airport security line (those places get awfully crowded), pull of a Mumbai-style shooting rampage of hotels or shopping malls, or even blow up or hijack a plane by taking advantage of the many ways into the "sterile" area in airports that don't pass through the TSA.
The US only exists because we used to have people wiser than this. Sam Adams exemplified their response: "May your chains rest lightly upon you and may posterity forget that you were our countrymen." I cannot believe our lives are more significant than theirs, which they willingly risked over what's really important.
http://therightperspective.org/2011/10/29/ron-paul-blasts-si... (Ron Paul Blasts "Sinister" TSA Checkpoint Program)
http://news.slashdot.org/story/11/10/28/1921254/tsas-vipr-bi... (TSA's VIPR Bites Rail, Bus, and Ferry Passengers)
http://theatlantic.com/national/archive/2011/10/like-tsa-you... (Like TSA? You'll Love VIPR!)("They should just call them the State Transit Authority for Safe Interstates and be done with it.")
http://www.tsa.gov/press/happenings/vipr_blockisland.shtm (VIPR Teams Enhance Security at Major Local Transportation Facilities)
http://www.tsa.gov/press/happenings/vipr_cities.shtm (TSA Supports VIPR Missions in Cities Coast to Coast)("VIPR teams enhance TSA's ability to leverage a variety of resources quickly to increase visible security in any mode of transportation anywhere in the country and are a normal component of TSA's nimble, unpredictable approach to security.")
The fees and licenses are barriers to entry that prevent established businesses from having to compete with a thousand nobodies. To an established business, the permit and license costs are trivial.
Once your food stand / hot dog cart business reaches a certain level of reliable revenue, it's rational to support increases in license costs for this very reason. I don't know, of course, but it wouldn't surprise me to learn that this is exactly what happened.
But it makes no sense to apply it to 7 year olds selling a bit of lemonade over a couple of weekends!
A permit, as defined by Black's law dictionary (paraphrased[1]), is authorization to commit an otherwise criminal/forbidden act. Thus if you had a skulking permit that authorizes you to steal and kill, you legally could commit what was a crime.
Permits, as treated/used by the US Government, are just another form of taxation. It has become "pay up, or it's illegal". According to my understanding of the Constitution this is illegal—but that's never stopped our government before.
So, with the requirements in place to make it illegal to manufacture/brew/sell food (including beverages, like lemonade or even tea) without a permit, we get a crackdown on kids selling bottled drinks or lemonade made from a mix, to enforce the laws.
And that's still ignoring the peddling license and the business license.
Just take a look at the permits/licenses required to operate shop today, and what is illegal because of it. I can't even finish my basement off without paying for a permit. For example, a heterosexual couple can't get married in most states without a permit. This practice came from interracial marriage being illegal in the 1900s and requiring a permit; prior to this time marriage was a (primarily) religious institution and people married without governmental interference. The idea of a marriage permit has since been promulgated as a "good idea," and "common-law marriages" are considered "bad ideas".
Give the government an inch and they take a mile...
Disclaimer: I am not a lawyer.
[1]: I had to paraphrase because I don't own a copy. I had to look it up in the library a while ago, and the definition stuck with me.
You tell your "public servant" what you want to do, and he decides if you will be allowed and how much it will cost you to obtain that permission.
It seems it's good to have health inspectors, and shut down the dodgy operators. It's also good to force restaurants to follow good practices. But the regulations always seem to grow, and don't always prevent disasters.
The problem is, disasters are "black swan" events. Builders take reasonable steps to avoid hitting their fingers with hammers, because it's a high incidence / small impact kind of thing. But low incidence / high impact things (like cutting off your hand with a buzzsaw) need a bit of regulation.
The problem is, regulation doesn't work. Someone will put up a sign spelling out how to use the buzzsaw, which people will follow for about 30 seconds before putting their hands in danger again.
You need education (safety signs), but you also need enforcement. And one of the best methods of enforcement is encouraging whistle-blowers. Whenever a real disaster happens, there's usually a clear paper trail of people making complaints about the potential hazard. People know the risk, but aren't able to escalate it to someone who can force mitigation. Obviously this is a sort of inverted survivor bias (no-one cares about paper trails when there's no body), but the point remains - people usually knew the disaster was waiting to happen, and weren't able to figure out what to do about it.
The most important regulation (I believe) is that safety complaints need to be made, and dealt with. No system is perfect, but overregulation encourages a system that looks perfect on paper while problems go unnoticed.
We used to, for the most part accept that such things would happen, and not try too hard to prevent them when the impact was mostly limited to the person making the poor decision leading to the accident. I'm not sure that's such a bad thing; regulations shift the responsibility and costs away from the person actually doing the potentially dangerous thing on to the organization as a whole. The whole process slows down as a result.
I'm not against regulations or some equivalent (such as best practices plus liability) in situations where someone being stupid puts many people or the public at large at risk, but don't tell me I need certification to use a buzzsaw. I learned to use one when I was 12.
Permits at the federal level. Permits at the federal level involve access to federal lands or resources. These permits are voluntary, quid pro quo (i.e., pay for service/access) payments. In that regard, a permit is no different than a rental fee a private business would charge (i.e., a ticket to Disneyland). This is not illegal under the Constitution.
Permits at the state level. Business permits are required by States and are part of the bloc of powers delegated to the States as purely local concerns. Again, not illegal under the Constitution.
Marriage permits have been around since the 1200s. They were originally established by the Catholic Church as a way to increase Church revenues. Eventually, governments took over that power for the same purpose. For hundreds of years, in the West, marriage permits have been a recognized power of government. Anybody can get married without a marriage permit in any State in America and live like man and wife (what is classically known as a "common law marriage"). However, if you want that marriage to be recognized by the government for legal and tax purposes, and get all the government-backed rights that come with government recognition, you need to pony up. Again, it's quid-pro-quo, and it's not illegal under the Constitution. (Common law marriages are no longer recognized by the government, but they're not illegal.)
Disclaimer: I am a lawyer.
However on Common Law marriage, I'm under the impression that existing Common Law marriages are recognized by the government because persons married outside the country fall under it (no idea where I got that from, now). Isn't the formation of a Common Law marriage no longer recognized outside a tiny list of states?
Though I do have to keep my complaint against getting a permit to finish my basement. We only fall under town ordinances, but it's completely ridiculous to say that I cannot finish my own basement without paying the piper.
it's completely ridiculous to say that I cannot finish my own basement without paying the piper.
What if you screw it up, flood your own basement, and weaken your neighbor's foundation? Most often you won't, but the permit is meant to incentivize you against such carelessness. It's the price you pay for the facts that a) some people are stupid, and b) that you have chosen to live near other people, so what you do potentially affects them.
Read this, and if you find it eye-opening then I strongly recommend Coase's original essay, which is short but extremely readable: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coase_theorem
That can still happen, regardless of what statutory b.s. the State concocts.
Most often you won't, but the permit is meant to incentivize you against such carelessness.
There's already an incentive against that: liability for the consequences of your actions.
It's the price you pay for the facts that a) some people are stupid, and b) that you have chosen to live near other people, so what you do potentially affects them.
None of that in any way justifies the need for inane government regulations that do nothing but inhibit your freedom because of hypothetical scenarios.
None of that in any way justifies the need for inane government regulations that do nothing but inhibit your freedom because of hypothetical scenarios.
You realize that these regulations are usually put in place as the result of litigation, yes? You know, dreadful injury happens, litigation ensues, party at fault demurs, plaintiffs campaign for better regulation to prevent similar injuries to others. All other things being equal, the cost of regulation or litigation ends up being the same, but it's a lot more predictable if you cover that cost up front.
Regulations assume the individual will take no responsibility. Admittedly, as I said above, there are people who do not do so. But if the judges threw the book at the people who did so, so that it cost more than just making restitution... maybe people would change.
Rather than just regulating ourselves into a straightjacket made of permits, I'd like (even a little) more responsibility over my mistakes and less permits to file/pay for.
What you call restitution is known in law as economic damages. When you mention throwing the book at people who try to evade their responsibilities, that's called punitive damages. The tort reform movement is always saying that damages are abusive and that people should be protected from punitive damages, and tend to be opposed to excessive regulation as well. The plaintiff bar argues that without the threat of unlimited liability injured parties will have no legal remedy.
Consider the alternative, where your neighbor turns out to be an obnoxious ass and brings suit against you without a good reason. It happens, and if your neighbor is wealthy or just very persistent then fighting off his suit will be an expensive inconvenience at best. By obtaining and complying with a permit, you are insulated from his abusive litigation.
This does not happen so often with homeowners, but such conflicts between businesses are not at all uncommon - think patent litigation. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sturges_v_Bridgman is a famous example; in a nutshell, your private rights are subordinate to society's overall interest, since the latter is nothing more than the aggregated interests of other private individuals. The object of fees and permits is not to maximize revenue but to minimize litigation, which usually ends up costing more than bureaucracy.
[1]: I had to paraphrase because I don't own a copy. I had to look it up in the library a while ago, and the definition stuck with me.
I do own a copy and it says no such thing, or even anything like it. I find this memory highly dubious, because permits are given for administrative matters, violation of which can incur a fee or a fine or a requirement of specific performance, but which most certainly cannot land you in jail or result in criminal liability. Historically the word derives from the French per mitter le droit which means 'for passing the right' [to a piece of real estate].
The phrase 'real estate' itself derives from French meaning 'royal estate'; back when all land was legally owned by the aristocracy, long-term renewable land rents were issued, some of which specified the acceptable use of the land - hence the word 'landlord.' In many places in Europe it's still common to buy a house but have to pay a (nominal) rent to someone who owns the underlying land, although this is nowadays a private individual or land investment company rather than an aristocrat. Real estate transactions in the US typically involve both the land and the buildings on it, but not always. Even back in the early days of the US state governments often retained some rights over the land granted or sold, such as the right to 'royalties' on mineral extraction.
I think you may have mis-remembered what you read, but Black's Law Dictionary has been through 9 editions. If you can remember when this was or anything else related to the research, I would be interested in looking it up at the university law library. As it is, I think you're mistaken. If one wanted to give permission for an activity that is normally criminal (possession of drugs by a medical researcher, say), one would seek immunity.
If one wanted to give permission for an activity that is normally criminal (possession of drugs by a medical researcher, say), one would seek immunity.
How would you be granted such immunity? As a license, or as a permit? ;)
No, its not an over-abundance of a thing, its a different kind of thing altogether. Some time in the last decade or so, we turned into something altogether different than what we were before and it feels like its just getting started.
Its not even so bad that they are ok with it. There have always been rotten apples. Its that (despite the small outrage), everyone else has just sort of become numb to this kind of ass-hattery. Try to imagine what would have happened in Mayberry in 1960 if the code enforcement office pulled something like this. I believe nearly everyone at the office would have instantly found themselves looking for a new line of work. It quite likely would have been difficult for them to even continue living in that area.
The whole idea of putting a human being at that post was to avoid this machine-like enforcement without discretion.
There's some kind of deep intractable cynicism that's changing the worldview of the United States (probably the whole "western world" to a lesser extent). Its more than just fear-"save me from the terrorists!", it has a raw edge of hopelessness to it that has never been present in the USA before.
Not so. A lot of times, in fact probably the majority, they are responding to complaints from other vendors.
This is especially true at events; vendors pay a lot of money (often a few thousand a day, paid months in advance) to the organizers for the right to set up a food or refreshment stall, and are subject to safety inspections themselves. So they object to anyone else coming along and doing the same thing for free, even if they're only selling small amounts. Event vendors live on fairly thin margins; since they're transient they can't count on repeat business of any kind. If it's a kid that's cute, but if the kid is selling commercial beverages rather than home-made lemonade (as shown in the photo accompanying the article), then professional retailers see that as a front for the parent who is buying the stuff in bulk at Costco. Having worked as an organizer on a few musical festivals, I regret to say that they're sometimes correct about this.
Would it change your opinion if you found out these kids were making $1000 a day? What if their parents were food vendors and didn't want to deal with permits, so they had their kids operate a stand? What if someone got salmonella from their lemonade?
I'm all for the cutesy kids killing a summer afternoon by selling homemade lemonade at the end of their driveway. The parents buying flats of drinks from Costco, a steel cashbox, and taking them to a street fair? Not so much.
One of the highest articles on HN right now is about a guy who ran a soda machine as a kid. I think most HN'ers would be fine if they made $1000/day, even if it was just a front for their parents. That's the kind of old fashioned entrepreneurialism that the average child will never even come close to experiencing; and they will be worse off for it.
In that other story, a kid's dad rented a soda machine and let the kid manage it. Presumably it complied with any applicable local laws regarding vending machine ownership, permits, taxes, safety, etc.
I'm all for kids learning entrepreneurship. I think the term 'Lemonade Stand' is loaded, at least for me, as it implies some innocent kind of hardly-profitable but fun thing for some kids to do once in a while. I think it would be great for some kids to see it grow and become mindful of business finances... but at that point, the line gets blurry for me.
When I was a wee lad in k-12 school, school parties were a smorgasbord of home-prepared treats (brownies, cookies, punch, you name it). Fifteen years later, when my kids were briefly in public school (we yanked 'em and un-school them now), home-made goodies are now forbidden as health hazards. So instead of a unique assortment of recipes, you get every kid offering the same bland varieties of Oreos, Ho-Hos, and Chips Ahoy.
Pardon my French, but it's a fucking sad state of affairs our society has found itself in.
Do you honestly believe that the two are exclusive?
I could maybe get if they were selling complex food stuff that the kids couldn't make themselves and the parents were using them to make some money using a loophole.
But I highly doubt this is the case with 25c lemonade stands.
Now the cops have to apply the law to everyone, and yes, if you want to give the police the power to move that person who makes you uncomfortable then you must give them the responsibility to shut down the lemonade stand.
But why? What is the risk here? I'm not asking about the actual risk, but what the perceived risk is from 7 year olds selling lemonade at 25c per cup.
Now if someone is selling food or beverages at an event, and people get sick from consuming the product, what od you think will happen? They sue the event organizer or whoever has the deepest pockets, saying 'you permitted the sale of the food that made me sick.' One could say that such people are litigation-happy weenies, but one also has to consider the sky-high cost of hospital treatment. Sometimes people's insurers will sue on their behalf to recover their treatment costs.
The enforcement actions I saw in the article were done by local police. Well, there are city councilmen out there who really like to be city councilmen, and will respond when home-owning, voting, constituents call up and complain. Before you start imagining yourself James Otis up against the Writs of Assistance, pick up the phone.
Seriously, though, there are a lot of other ways for kids to show entrepreneurship and make money. Lemonade stands, if anything, teach that being cute gets you handouts. Mow some lawns, wash some cars, cut some hedges.
But seriously, this topic makes me wonder about all sorts of things we did as kids that might have been technically illegal but we all did anyway. Such as mowing lawns and babysitting while too young. Did you know most states technically require sitters to be 16 years or older?!? The paperboy as we fondly remember it (I want my two dollars!) might be technically illegal. I mean, don't labor laws restrict non-farm employment to 16 years and older?
I'd be curious to see a real, thorough analysis of the legality of so many things we take for granted.
I was a paperboy. Technically, I was an independent contractor. Therefore, they had no legal responsibility to me. Of course, I was entirely responsible to them, and I wasn't allowed to run my route like a proper business (e.g. no payment for three days, cut them off). Basically, it was training for being taken advantage of by large(r) corporations.
Nowadays, it looks like all the paper delivery around here is done by adults. One drives while the other walks and tosses papers at 3am. Better experience for the customer, billing is automated, and no kids are exploited. A loss of an American tradition, perhaps, but a tradition which became a mild form of exploitation rather than empowerment.
Incidentally, on the subject of machinery, tasks should be relegated by age. A twelve year old is probably capable of handling basic lawn machinery, though 14 or 16 is probably better. An eight year old can certainly rake leaves, dig holes, and trim bushes. A four year old can rake leaves and move rocks. I did lawn work for my grandparents every summer and, despite being disallowed the riding lawnmower, I was reasonably effective.
Another point I'll make is that both lemonade stands and paper routes are basically dead-end. You can't franchise a lemonade stand. As a paperboy, you can conceivably upgrade to a scooter to cover more distance, but you're still stuck personally collecting money from all the deadbeats. It's really just wage-labor under an entrepreneurial fog.
That's a good point, but you would only want the child to do the stand for a weekend or so, or maybe a couple of weeks over a summer, to teach them simplistic stuff about adding value, and making profit.
Another tangential point: I learned much more from manning my family's garage sale than from any other single money-making endeavor. I suppose the modern equivalent is eBay. In fact, come to think of it, what could be better than getting rid of the junk cluttering your house than telling your kid he/she can keep all the profit?
I think the bureaucratic state has gone far enough. This is a shining example in my mind of why smaller government is better. Just think, every one of those people responsible for shutting down a lemonade stand is making a living wage, made possible by my 33% tax contribution. Sickening.
A kid will learn much more by doing odd jobs for older people in the neighborhood. Mowing, yard raking, hedge trimming, window cleaning. The only thing you learn at a lemonade stand is that being cute earns handouts, and very basic change-making.
That said, local licensing and business registration needs a special < 18 category. Oregon, for example, has a minimum incorporation fee of, I think, $250. It should be $40 or $20 if you're under 18.
If you were genuinely concerned, you could always ask them how they made it, and if anything seemed fishy (improper cleaning, ingredient prep, etc) you can always walk away. The existence of the stall isn't in itself a hazard, and in the majority of cases, there won't be any problems at all.
The problem is in the 0.1% of cases where someone didn't wash their lemons, or has been snacking on peanuts near an open container or something similar, and there's a major incident. Risk/benefit analysis suggests you should avoid it and go grab a coke instead, but there's nothing stopping you picking up a cup of lemonade and tipping it down the drain if you wanted to encourage some neighbours children to pursue their business ideas.
I agree that there's less to learn, but also there's much lower risk to the children (gardening work will often involve pointy things and/or power tools), and it could well be a good place to start.
I'm not sure how the licensing issue could be dealt with, since AFAIK a minor can't enter into the majority of contracts that might be necessary to obtain permits/handle licences.
The number of cases of food poisoning in the US food service industry each year leads me to believe that it's not so easy to detect contaminated food sources.
And yes, you can buy a cup and throw it out, but we're really back to asking what lesson you're teaching. I maintain you're teaching "be cute, get handouts, ignore costs" early with a lemonade stand.
The only difference is that someone in a chair with a sign is a really easy target.
That's pure, baseless FUD. I did plenty of side work cleaning windows, mirrors, sweeping garages, and various other tasks that the elderly people on my paper route didn't feel comfortable doing. Contrary to the ridiculous rumors I've seen floated on this site's comments, it's not an employer/employee relationship.
http://reason.com/blog/2011/07/18/lemonade-stand-crackdown-c...
http://reason.com/blog/2011/10/10/free-the-lemonade-three
http://reason.com/blog/2011/08/24/concord-cop-threatens-came...
http://reason.com/blog/2011/08/17/saturday-is-lemonade-freed...
http://reason.com/blog/2005/08/03/when-lemonade-is-illegal
http://reason.com/blog/2009/08/06/lemonade-is-not-a-crime
http://reason.com/blog/2011/07/01/reasontv-the-war-on-lemona...
But hey, I personally enjoy the smell of sand, so I wouldn't blame you for keeping your head there as long as you like...
I saw:
* Anti-competition ordinances around a special event * Lemonade stand on a busy intersection * At a specially permitted farmers' market, a vendor (not even a kid) crashing the market to sell his stuff, with a bonus dispute over the right to film police
The "War on Lemonade Stands" angle is propaganda: it's inventing a misleading emotionally-powerful angle in order to add rhetorical power to an argument over a separate issue.
>Police in Georgia have shut down a lemonade stand run by three girls trying to save up for a trip to a water park, saying they didn't have a business license or the required permits.
>Midway Police Chief Kelly Morningstar says police also didn't know how the lemonade was made, who made it or what was in it. [...]
>The girls needed a business license, peddler's permit and food permit to operate, even on residential property. The permits cost $50 a day or $180 per year. [...]
>The girls are now doing chores and yard work to make money.
That was nothing like you described.
"...but many of the regulations that come down the pipeline are pushed by brick-and-mortar competitors who want to keep competition at a minimum."
Or perhaps the brick-and-mortar competitors simply want for the competition to be on even ground. If the kids were required jump through the same hoops as the legit stands, then the kids likely need to sell lemonade at higher prices than a quarter.
"Police said the girls needed a business license, a peddler’s permit, and a food permit to operate the stand, which cost $50 per day or $180 per year each, sums that would quickly cut into any possible profit-margin."
Correct. These fees cut into profit margins for all stands. Why should kids get special treatment?
"Who stands to lose from a couple of six-year-olds selling lemonade?"
Any purchase I make at one stand is a lost opportunity for another stand. Again, why should kids receive special treatment?
"Kids have been selling lemonade for decades without permits of any sort. They often set the stands up just for fun, but many lemonade stands (or bake sales) are used to raise money for schools, cancer, or sick pets. Lemonade stands represent the most innocent, optimistic side of capitalism out there."
Lemonade stands for kids is a great learning experience. Having to deal with the law is part of that learning experience. A lemonade stand run by kids and shut down by the police is as good a learning experience as one that is able to run without interference from the government. If the startup costs of a lemonade stand are too high, then perhaps the kids should try a different line of business.
Look, just because brick and mortar pay fees doesn't mean it's also justified for them to impose it on their competition. Maybe the fee or the law are unjust. Just get rid of them and let them run their business.
Back to lemonade stands: use your common sense. If kids are running it and you don't trust kids' hygiene or ability to make lemonade or whatever, don't buy the lemonade. There is no possible reason why a license is required.
I'm thankful for the U.S. being strict on food safety / handling standards. I'm currently living in the Philippines and I had traveler's diarrhea for the first few months I lived here and I still get it regularly after a few years. Common sense helps, but it only goes so far.
Food permits & vendor licensing fees are there for a reason. Go look up your local county health departments food inspection results for local food vendors. You'll be surprised at some of the joints that are barely staying within the food safety guidelines.
As far as kids go, they are definitely not infallible when it come to food safety. I saw friends running stands as a child & they were reusing cups, diluting the product & I am not sure if they ever washed their hands.
Um, because on earth at least, it's a common practice, even encouraged to give kids special treatment. You don't need a fishing license until you're 16, "kids ride free", etc.
They'll have plenty of time to become the kind of bitter adult who will think "being shut down by the police is a good learning experience" later.
Nope. Plenty of kids fish by themselves. In fact, most kid fishing used to be with other kids or alone, with no adults, and I'd be somewhat surprised if that had changed.
Better to have a cliff:
* When you are obviously under some minimum, regulation does not apply.
* When you appear to be near the cliff or over, the regulation applies (or you have to do the paperwork to show that the regulation does not apply).
This practice works well for many regulations, including most business regulations with small-business exemptions, Alternative Minimum Tax, checking ID for buying alcohol, etc.
Because they're kids!
Are children even legally allowed to apply for these permits? If a parent does it, is it even legal for their 7 year old kid to work at the stand?
How is threatening a child with fines a good learning experience? All it will do is crush their spirit.
So?
What do you have against kids earning money?
Or, is it that they shouldn't do any work?
Lots of kids mow their parent's lawns and take out the trash. Is that wrong?
If not, why is it wrong if they do it for someone else?
What is wrong with people?
http://blogs-images.forbes.com/erikkain/files/2011/08/lemona... Strangely enough, I'm not seeing them either.
Edit: that's the picture Forbes used to illustrate the article. It's not my fault it doesn't match up with the described ideal.
Really? You find a kids' lemonade stand in your neighborhood and find yourself thinking: a) "Man! I really want to drive out of my neighborhood and buy from stranger kids but this stand right here makes it terribly inconvenient for me". Or more like b) "look how cute, I'll plunk down a quarter to really inspire my neighborhood kids' entrepeneur spirit!". Your purchase was never an opportunity for another stand. I hope you don't seriously think you can legislate opportunity.
> why should kids receive special treatment?
Is it so hard to see? It's a calculated risk, a trade-off. You can spend a few cents here and now, maybe even spill the lemonade around the corner, but helped some young minds dream that they can one day make the whole of society richer by being wealth creators. Society's risk? a bad tasting lemonade? It's all upside, no downside.
Why should kids not follow food regulations? good question. Why should anyone? I don't want to go to that rabbit hole, but it's easy to see how a little protection here, and a little there, leads to more rules for regulations' sake. We have so many laws no grown-up can keep up, not even lawyers, and to me it's clearly unreasonable to think that a child could or even would.