Comment by npunt

> My post was not about manufacturers or liablity, so I don't know why you're arguing that here.

Because that was the context of the post you replied to.

> To turn your car example around, a ton of regulations exist for safety features in cars. Why not for table saws?

Regulation of this type generally falls into two categories.

The first is sensible new safety technologies that are in the process of being adopted by the market anyway. Legislators then race to mandate them so they can try to take credit for the resulting safety improvement that would have happened regardless.

The second is incumbents who have invented something weak and then discover that their "feature" is failing in the market because it's burdensome to use or isn't worth the cost, so they try to have it mandated.

Both of these are dumb. The second one is more dumb, but we can get a better understanding of how by noticing the problem with the first: It's mandating a particular technology. Now nobody can invent something better because better is different and different is prohibited.

It also eliminates nuance and context. For example, package delivery trucks are required to have seat belts like anything else. But the drivers don't use them, because they'd be getting in the truck, putting on the seat belt, driving ten feet to the next house and then taking it back off again. It would be better to design the vehicle to be driven while standing up and then use some alternate mechanism to restrain the driver in the event of a crash, like a padded barrier at the level of the driver's chest and waist which would still be in place even when the driver only expects to be in the vehicle for ten seconds. But that's not allowed, so the mandate precludes a passive safety feature in favor of a manual one that the drivers often don't use.