It's becoming more clear that in the US health and safety are taking a back seat to corporate profits. It's shameful to read safety equipment that could have prevented this derailment was lobbied against by the railway industry.
The ECP wikipedia gets into a lot of the details, but by evenly braking instead of the first cars braking and getting "pushed" by the back ones, you limit the risk of derailment by some amount.
The counterfactual of "what would have happened" with them is hard to answer with any certainty, but much less kinetic energy in the system and more even braking could have only helped.
By definition the EPA, FDA, etc give corporations protections from events, not the other way around.
For instance, even if a company is provably causing me harm, say through a drug injury, I can’t sue the company for false advertising — FDA approved.
How about the EPA? Same deal, I can’t sue a company for causing me injuries due to carbon dioxide, so long as they follow EPA regulations. Historically, before all these agencies you could sue for any injury that caused harm (ie the law).
The FDA fines and sues companies not following the rules. They set a floor for behavior and mitigate frivolous lawsuits. This help companies and society, this is better for both. This isn't a pie we are dividing, this is complex system we are building together.
The current system isn't perfect but things are clearly better with than without. Businesses know what they can and can't be sued for and overall less bad shit happens to the populace. It isn't like I have the ability to sue people dumping CO2 into the air. Because lawsuits need more than someone polluting, they need someone to break a rule or cause direct harm and for the victim to know who to sue and have money to do it with
We could theoretically make these systems better by making the rules better and sometimes we even do.
I think the most damning thing is that cases of black lung are actually on the rise in Appalachia in the 21st century because companies have managed to slacken worker protections for coal miners.
Where it becomes an issue, is indeed when you are not your own master, and the risk and profit being borne by different people cause warped incentives...