He lived. And learned a $300k lesson about being prepared so you don’t mess up the world. Seems like the justice system working.
There are so many things companies and others do that impose costs on others that singling out only those which meet a threshold that make it worth taking to court creates a discontinuity in outcomes which makes it seem punitive here.
I also hope the fine here is proportional to his ability to pay. Bankrupting poor people for mistakes in the outdoors, where the same penalty is expensive but manageable for the rich, also doesn't seem just.
The government cares more about corporations than people. We live in a corpocracy, not a democracy.
Certainly there are problems with corporations not bearing the costs of the problems / issues they create. But that means we need better laws to capture that, not that this guy was unjustly punished.
How can one come to this conclusion given the trends in people’s weights?
Cigarettes come to mind. You’re fine with penalizing this guy $300,000 for doing something stupid and penalizing society hundreds of millions of dollars for the maliciousness of RJR Nabisco, Philip Morris, etc.
If it's truly "die vs. do this and live the rest of my life in debt," yeah. It's worth it to take on the debt.
But it'll force another level of creativity out of you before you decide the only way to save your life is to light a whole dead tree on fire and hope for the best.
it's been my experience that if I push it all the way to the last resort to save my life I am
1. not in a good state to make that decision
2. not in a good state to do the necessary steps to make the last resort work correctly.
It'll be hanging over you when you're out, as things get worse and worse. You'll start thinking of alternatives much earlier, because the potential of living the rest of your life in debt if you only find a destructive way to stay alive won't let you wait as long to be thinking about solutions.
Nobody's reading this article from a place where they're already at "light a forest fire or die" danger level. This only works as a deterrent and a cautionary tale because people are finding out about it before they're in dire trouble.
The point of bankruptcy is to allow you to give up all your possessions in return for being able to shed all debt. It's a simple trade, and lets you 'start afresh'.
And it's kinda an even better deal than it appears - you get to keep your knowledge, your friends and your qualifications - so in your 2nd start, you will probably achieve a much better trajectory than the first.
He made mistakes, and almost lost his life. That's the punishment, not a fine that he'll never be able to pay and will ruin the rest of his life.
It will also affect how others handle the situation, potentially causing more harm to or loss of life.