US Regulation of Sausages

Given the repetitive history of industrial scale food production problems (cutting corners, lying or at least shading the truth about ingredients, undisclosed additives etc etc), there's a couple of things about leaving it to courts and insurance that seem left unsaid.

The first is that large food production firms have the ability to harm large numbers of citizens. See the latest Boar's Head debacle, but there are other examples from Rocky Ford melon listeria to sodium nitrates in bacon and ham. Economies of scale apply to harms as well. I suspect this would lead to very cautious consumption after a few huge e. coli outbreaks, and maybe even some torches and pitchforks.

Second, courts... who enforces the court orders and verdicts? Do we just piously hope that everyone agrees with the slew of verdicts? That seems unlikely, there are both bad faith actors, and good faith disagreements. It would seem that relying on courts and insurance would lead to a very large, expensive, court order enforcement agency.