FBXL Social

Regulations, and particularly the codes and standards incorporated into regulations, aren't treated the same as laws often, you can't see them without spending a lot of money. It's one of the things postmodern bureaucracy did that breaks democracy. Doesn't matter who you vote for if the MPs or congressmen aren't making the bulk of the rules.

In many jurisdictions, you need to be compliant with certain standards that aren't government regulations to be compliant with the laws and regulations. That could be the ISO or IEC in Europe, and it appears that the BSI and IET in England are responsible for electrical codes, the NFPA in the US, or CSA in Canada. These organizations typically are not government organizations. Their codes and standards are incorporated by reference into regulations, rather than directly stated as rules directly.

As an example, if you think the Canadian Electrical Code is too draconian, there is no party you can vote for in parliament that will ever change the Canadian Electrical Code, because parliament doesn't write the Canadian Electrical Code, the CSA does.

Although the law out of congress or parliaments are always public, the regulations of specific government departments may or may not be public(but usually is available), and the code or standards those regulations incorporate aren't public (in the sense that you must purchase a licensed copy), and the specifics of how the regulation is applied by a certain bureaucrat exists only in that bureaucrat's head.

It's also important to realize that often, the codes and standards that are private and copyrighted make up a substantial bulk of the actual regulation. A regulation incorporating a few CSA standards may be a few dozen pages, but the referenced CSA standards may be cumulatively hundreds or thousands of pages long, meaning that most of the law effectively isn't the law itself, or even the regulation itself, but the hidden part.

Since the majority of the rules are not produced by the government, and the government has no way of changing those parts of the rules, voting can't affect the majority of the rules in government, and it's even challenging for the courts since the courts mainly have jurisdiction in rules written by parts of the government.

Codes and Standards can have the force of law behind them when they are adopted by regulators, meaning they effectively are the law, but they aren't laws because they aren't created like laws or treated like laws. A non-government body uses whatever methods it likes to create the codes, and it isn't anything like what we'd consider government.

Typically, while regulations directly created by a regulatory agency will be subject to some form of review (at least internal review, if not public review), codes and standards are the creation and the property of the non-profit that creates it, and typically won't be up for debate per se.

You can't sue the body that created the codes because you don't like the code in the same way you can challenge unjust laws directly, I suspect there'd be a problem with standing where they don't owe you anything since they're "just" the creators of codes and standards that are treated as law, but which are not law themselves. The lawsuits you found consisted of the private not for profit protecting its copyright and someone suing the CSA because of an employment dispute. Peripheral issues such as these are not relelvant to the discussion of the nature of codes and standards in the context of their use as regulations. That's the reason I brought up the ampacity of a wire, because that's an example of an actual code or standard, and something aimed at the CSA challenging a regulation like that would be highly relevant to the discussion.

The nature of a bureaucratic process is such that an order from a bureaucrat isn't like a charge in court, there's typically no lawyer involved, you just get the demand and typically you're expected to comply, and that's the expected process. Get a different bureaucrat on a different day, and you'll get a different order, or the opposite order, or no order at all.

Besides the regulations that are written down, there's the stuff the regulator will just tell you to do without really having any basis for it but if you don't do what they tell you you're gonna get in trouble, and with one sentence written on a piece of paper (more likely send as a pdf file these days) they can cost you millions. -- This is just a reality of dealing with a bureaucracy. Its a separate issue from the codes, but can be related in that the code which was created in a sort of arbitrary way is then interpreted by the local agent of the regulator who is just an employee. You can have the regulator tell you to do all kinds of things, and often it isn't really feasible to go "I need a lawyer!" because there isn't really anything to sue over -- Although of the three countries only the US has Chevron deference that gives wide latitude to regulators, typically a regulator acting within their mandate is going to be given some level of deference in all three countries. That why I said "That's not how this works. This isn't a courtroom, you've got a regulatory order in front of you, sit down shut up and do what we tell you."

If you are charged with something in court and they say "we're going to prove you are in violation of X and then mandate you to fix it" there is a process that is due to you to question whether they're right (and that standard can be different in a civil or criminal context, but there is a standard, be it 51% or 90%). If you're given an order by an inspector, you could use different processes to appeal and ultimately even sue, but it's a much different process and arguing isn't built into the process in the same way. Even for a multinational corporation, they'll follow the order, even if it's a relatively big deal to do so. Either way, it's not likely you'll be able to argue your way out of following a code or standard that's been adopted in a certain way even if it's a little unreasonable, or if the code or standard isn't really clear whereas in a courtroom you at least have stare decisis and so once a decision has been made that's the rule.

So the world is not a courtroom, and a lawyer isn't going to often be very effective in situations where it's unlikely for any disagreements to make it as far as litigation.

For more examples of how bureaucrats can poke their fingers into things and recourse is challenging and likely not even going to come up even with respect to mega-corps, look at all the government actors that we now know had their fingers in twitter, Facebook, and YouTube. They made their request, and it was somewhat extra-legal, and it was definitely unlawful under the US constitution, but they did it anyway and they got their way and the company didn't even try to fight any of it because the world isn't a courtroom.

The opaque nature of this whole system means a few things. First, it's largely opaque to the democratic republican or parliamentary forms of government because the majority of the rules are not created by any government actor. Second, because it's opaque, it isn't managed or controlled by anyone in charge. Third, because of the nature of bureaucratic rule making, it tends to grow and become stricter and larger over time as more reasons to add more rules show up. Finally, because it tends to get stricter and larger in an uncontrolled manner, you end up with situations where entire industries are in some degree of regulatory gridlock, such as the housing industry, which has led to housing costing insane amounts around the developed world.

There's 2 options, I think. Some bureaucracies ultimately topple themselves over and take their empires with them. Other times, another force with equal appeal is able to help curb the bureaucrats. They can do some good work and have brought about good times in many eras, but left to their own devices they are quite conservative (not necessarily politically, but practically) and institutional conservatism can end an institution.

I think it's safe to blame the end of the Chinese empire on bureaucracy to an extent. It obviously wasn't a direct factor, but the intense conservatism led them to turn away the English who had technology centuries ahead of anything China had, and if they were more interested in the outside world then they may not have been so badly humbled by the outside world they neglected.

Hopefully, political reforms come in the future to release the stranglehold the bureaucratic state has on our civilization. Otherwise our kids may not be the same stuff as we are, as another civilization wins culturally.

@sj_zero This is one of the reasons to move to the Second World. Countries that can barely keep the lights on don't care about how many light sockets you have on each wall of a "bedroom". They may say they do, but in practice nobody cares, and practice is what matters.

There is a shop at the end of the block that has steel strips screwed onto their breaker box to physically prevent the breakers from flipping off. That breaker box has no door and is right by the check stand and main entrance. Maybe one day I'll take a picture. This is in no way unusual. Mexico is a libertarian paradise compared to its northern neighbors.

Part of the problem of being a rich country is you have the resources to waste on bullshit.

@sj_zero We just installed a 2800 liter cistern because sometimes there's a water outage of up to a week while they do maintenance on the system. In a dense urban area.

I wouldn't want to worry about water, but it might not be so bad for some people to be reminded that services don't just happen.

@sj_zero Worst case, if the cistern runs low we can call a truck to come top it off for about $100 USD. You can't drink the tap water anyway, so all drinking water is purified water from 5 gallon carboys. You can get one delivered to your house for a dollar.

Ah, I didn't realize that. I was gonna say something about bleach to prevent legionnaires disease, but realized you probably know more about it than me, now I'm glad I didn't mention it. haha

@sj_zero Legionnaires' Disease is mostly a problem in tank-based hot water heaters set to code-mandated low temperatures (lest grandma accidently burn herself doing something retarded.) Nobody has that type here. Mostly it's roof-mounted solar heaters (which often literally boil over in the summer) and an old-style pass-through gas heater they call a "boiler". Instantaneous heaters are becoming more common, like the one we have. They cost more upfront but save a lot on gas. The Second World, almost by definition, isn't too good at long-term financial planning in aggregate.

I hate that they have started calling 180 degree water heaters boilers.

@gentoobro @sj_zero I don't think liberty should mean that you are allowed to do things that endanger other people.

@Dudebro @gentoobro @sj_zero but we were taught in school water boils at 180 degrees, I dont see what the problem is

Are you at 100,000 feet?

@Dudebro @gentoobro @sj_zero we read 100,000 feet under the sea 4 different times in my junior year of highschool back in the day. The goal was to get to 800,000 but a double suicide put a stop to us just reading it once a month every month of that school year

What the hell did I just read? lmao

Internet stuff

@sj_zero @gentoobro @Dudebro it's OK we switched from cheap Chinese translation of Nemo to Arabic version of ahab and only had 4 bombthreats called afterwards

@sj_zero @Dudebro @gentoobro it makes more sense if you know our English teacher was from Greece and therefore obsessed with semen

@Dudebro @sj_zero Ours is set to 50C, whatever the hell that is in Based Units.

@sapphire @sj_zero Shitty ones are. Don't buy a shitty one. Made that mistake the first time, but not the second.

122F Thats not even a warmer let alone a boiler.

WHUH YOU MEAN YOU AINT NIGGA YOU SOME BITCH MADE NIGGA?

The Chinese translation, "245,262 li under the sea"

@Hyolobrika @sj_zero Then don't move to Mexico. There are literally 6 foot deep open holes in the sidewalks because people are too cheap or lazy to replace their cistern cover. I just step around them.

@Dudebro @sj_zero That's the fully regulated output temperature. Tank-based heaters have to be a lot hotter inside because of how they work. New cold water flows in and mixes with the existing hot water as you use it. This is why a tank-based heater gets slowly colder as you "run out of hot water". Our instantaneous heater can run continuously for hours at 50C output, limited only by propane in the tank.

@sapphire @sj_zero > 40+ gallons of emergency water

lol. lmao even.

Our heater is digitally regulated. It works the same at all flow rates. It also runs on propane and only needs a little power to operate which can be easily provided by a UPS at night.

We have about 5000 liters of water across several cisterns, and enough propane on hand to last about 6 months. We have solar panels too, which work quite well here and mostly cancel out the power bill normally.

@gentoobro @sj_zero What's your definition of 2nd world?

@Vril_Oreilly @sj_zero Roughly, off the top of my head, any place where you can't drink the tap water, the low-level government officials accept bribes for violations of unimportant laws, you average at least one power outage per month, and it's legal for poor people to run street food stands.

I'll update it sometime when I come up with a better one.

@sapphire @sj_zero Yes! My life is fulfilled now!

@gentoobro @sj_zero so what's the difference between that and 3rd world for you?

@gentoobro @Vril_Oreilly @sj_zero It's legal for poor people to run street food stands anywhere, what do you mean?

@Vril_Oreilly @sj_zero The Third World has no practical infrastructure or basic rule of law. In Congo, there's no tap water to drink or power to go out. In Mexico, a $20 bribe gets you out of not having a driver's license. In Congo, goons of the warlord that passes for the local government just rape you and steal your car.

I believe the numbering of "worlds" is a relic of the cold war, the first world being developed democratic capitalist countries, the second world being communism, and the third world being anything else. Today I think it would be undeveloped or underdeveloped nations, developing nations, and developed nations.

@Hyolobrika @Vril_Oreilly @sj_zero In the US, street food is illegal in practice. Aside from most localities simply not handing out permits for it, there are a mountain of health codes, business regulations, and specialized taxes and permits that make it prohibitively expensive for any normal person. Whether you agree with those regulations is not relevant; they exist. This is why there isn't some dude with a grill selling hot dogs on every other street corner like there are taco stands here.

I had a friend whose family ran food trucks in Seattle about 10 years ago. Each one cost about a quarter million dollars to set up, mostly due to regulations. To sell tacos.

That sounds annoying.

how much is the bribe to just get a driver's license?

I had some tenants from India, they were telling me that restaurants there just open, people try their hand at it and either succeed or fail, not like the bureaucratic process here.

I think we don't realize just how locked down we are, but I know my grandfather died bitter having fought the fascists in the name of freedom only to see his freedoms slowly taken away, and my father tells me things were very different when he was young.

@Hyolobrika @Vril_Oreilly @sj_zero Where I live in Mexico the street vendor license costs about $100 per year. That's more to locals, but not much more. It would be like $500 in the eyes of a Unitedstatesian. Half of the vendors don't have a license because $20 will get the inspector to fuck off, assuming he ever shows up and hassles you.

I estimate you could get a small taco stand set up for about $600, assuming you were buying everything retail and didn't already own a canopy or chairs or a grill.

In American terms, imagine if you could make a cool grand tax free in cash every Friday night for an investment of $4k total. This is why there are tacos stands on every other street corner.

I'd love to have food stands on every street corner where I live.

I remember there being a burger stand in a nearby city. That was nice while I still ate meat.

There's lots of food stands in Bristol.

@gentoobro @sj_zero gotcha. I would kill to get out of amerikwa but I haven't yet devised a way to make a living outside the country (not making one inside it right now either fwiw)

@Vril_Oreilly @sj_zero I calculate that a frugal, single man with flexible living standards could get by on $200/mo around here. That means $2500 of savings would give you a year to figure out how to make $200/mo.

@Vril_Oreilly @sj_zero Like by selling hot dogs on the street corner.

Also, America is like a jealous girlfriend, she expects you to send her money even if you're not around. (probably not on 2500 a year mind you) but she still wants you to file taxes and pay any applicable taxes.

They need that money to regulate food stands!

@Hyolobrika @Vril_Oreilly @sj_zero I can't speak of Britain; I've never been there. It's my understanding that Europe is less retarded in general when it comes to petty regulations and such. Fewer NIMBYs.

@sj_zero @Vril_Oreilly First, you only have to file taxes if you make enough money. My accountant said the filing limit this year is around $24k for married couples (probably half for singles). $12k is a pretty decent wage here.

Second, I just have an accountant do it all for me. I set up a little LLC with some registered agent service, which is nice because I can put it as my employer on various government forms instead of the dreaded "self employed". The accountant costs $200/yr and the LLC costs about $180/yr, mostly the registered agent service. For $380/year, I just don't have to think about taxes. When you're not paying $3k/mo in rent, $380/yr is pennies.

Third, AFAIK (IANAL), there's some sort of tax treaty between the US and Mexico where you don't have to pay taxes to one on money that you already paid in the other. This is mosly relevant if you make money *in Mexico*, like working a proper above-the-table employer-employee type job in Mexico. Ask your accountant.

The fact that 3k/month for rent isn't in any way hyperbole in many places really saddens me. You know, I'm not *that* old, and when I was just getting on my feet you could get a 2 bedroom place for 250. Shared it with my brother. Now you might be able to get that place for 1500. And they say 2% inflation.
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@sj_zero @Vril_Oreilly @Hyolobrika Freedom is just a plane ticket away, if you are able to adjust your preconceptions about how the world works.

@ryan @Vril_Oreilly @sj_zero I've heard from various Uber drivers that you can skip the test for about $100 USD. All the cops that ever pulled me over back when I drove here accepted my US license without question. Nowadays I just ride a shitty bike and take the occasional Uber because it's cheaper and easier in a city that's not terminally car-dependent.

@sj_zero @Vril_Oreilly Prices have changed in the last couple years, but when I first arrived we rented a 1br/1ba loft in a historic house near the hip nightlife district for about $300/mo, cash, on a 3-month lease. Technically, it was a hotel since technically it's illegal to have sub-1-year leases in Mexico. Technically. A lot of the difficulty in moving to the 2nd world is learning how things actually work and not trying to live against the grain. Talk to people and don't be afraid to ask if there's another way to do things than the way you know.

@sj_zero @Vril_Oreilly Correct on all counts.

@gentoobro @Vril_Oreilly @sj_zero
I'm from Mexico.
I have another question, how long the power outage has to last?
because probably there are some power outage but last one minute here at week or even seconds.

@sj_zero very dense post, i'd recommend dividing it into sessions and adding titles.

@sj_zero I'm a government bureaucrat in Mexico and a public certified accountant and this instance sys admin. And this government is indeed, pretty bureaucratic.
Many of the things resonated with me. Besides the law, hey are books of rules published by the government, but also inner rules created not by the government but as you said, as the branch, department or institution. And besides agreements, a council creates more concrete rules known as agreement. This last one is published in the official government site. This is what most people don't know, but all the relevant legal stuff is printed in the documents they sign but most people don't read.
This council is interesting, they are representatives from business, for workers and the state. But they are selected innerly and little relevance has the party you vote.
It's possible what you say, that one day a bureaucrat says something, and the other another says other things. In my experience there are two causes, one is because a bureaucrats gave opinions or makes a suggestion in a department that is not theirs, or because there are problems at operative level, communication issues are very likely or lack of training.
I'm a firmly believer that most of the issues in an organization comes from the management.
If a proper boss is well trained, a lot of this issues can be mitigated.

I noticed that when my coworker is with an stupid boss (someone who was not properly trained) creates rules of his own or makes questionable or contradictory declarations , but I believe I have made him to be a better himself, because i'm very communicative and he improved communication with our supervision as well.
Proper communication with the supervision is very important and ofc, proper management. Most of the errors of an organization comes from the management, or at least, that is what administrative theory says.
And what you say about hiring a lawyer, I believe that is very possible doing so, the knowledge is power and there a lot of specific details in the law that are unknown for most people. That is what I am planning doing a major in Laws soon. At least here in Mexico, I consider the one who gets the propers lawyers, is very likely to gain against the state.

I don't consider that laws are opaque by themself, there is an institution for transparency here. But laws regulates something as complex as society and you can't expect someone to be an expert at laws and normative. The hierarchy is pretty clear in bureaucratic organizations and follows the traditional pyramidal structure. So there clearly are responsible.

I don't agree with your conclusions
When it comes to regulations such as the ISO, the management theory says that increased the quality. There are statistics that adopting quality normative such as the ISO (the name can vary regionally ) increased they efficiency greatly.
Adoption of normative also increases the perceived value with the business because as they strive for quality, they take in account the consumer, but with normative the client is not always right, because what can be offered is different, here is when comes normative.
You need certain parameters to evaluate your product because client opinions can be pretty subjective, these parameters are the normative.
This is for the best.
In the theory of administrative organizations, bureaucracy is unavoidable in complex organizations, specially ones from the governments since the type of organizations focuses on function instead of profit.
In my own experience, is technology what can help solve a lot of the bureaucracy issues, here in Mexico technology of 40 or 20 years old are still used and in some areas process that has 20 years old or ever older are still used.

I'm a living normative and laws handbook.

@daya @Vril_Oreilly @sj_zero Long enough to make the clock on your microonda reset. I get at least one or two per month here in one of the big cities.