Liability strict

Strict liability is a two-part social policy enforced by the courts. The first part of the policy is risk allocation -manufacturers who benefit from the sale of their products in the market place are to compensate consumers who are injured by those products because the manufacturer is in a better position to bear the cost of such ipjuries-directly or through insurance. The second concept is an incentive to deterrence -the manufacturer is in the best position to discover defects or dangers in his product and to take steps to guard against them.  

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The distinction between software as a product and software as a service seems more relevant to research. As Prince [22] suggests, the fact that software is sold and used as a prepackaged item means that strict liability obtains. Should there be a defect in the software, the manufacturer is held liable. Flowever, and especially with research, software is often written with a specific purpose in mind. As such, the programmer is providing a service rather than a product. In the case of software written specifically for a certain research purpose, the liability may not fall exclusively on the software provider. In those situations, it behooves the researcher to be very clear in knowing and stating his or her purposes to the programmer. 

Manufacturers of products placed into commerce (including pharmaceutical manufacturers) are liable for harms caused by their defective products without the need for the plaintiff to prove that the manufacturer was negligent or at fault. This approach, known as strict liability, is one of the main approaches used in product liability cases. Strict liability is based on the three-part rationale that manufacturers are in a better position to spread... 

Stigmatization, disease-based, 75-77 Strict liability, 190, 191, 326-327 Structural Genomics Project, 41 Studies, federally funded, 280. See also Research... 

Strict Liability The responsible party is liable even though they have exercised reasonable care. 

Tables 21.7 and 21. 8 set out in very simple terms the necessary ingredients for establishing product liability, either in negligence or under statute so-called strict liability.

Is the manufacturer or marketer of a handgun, in general, liable under any strict liability theory to a person injured as a result of the criminal use of its product ... 

In fhe case of chemical exposures thaf are privafe goods, govern-menf should provide information rather than regulation. And the negligence liability rule, rather than strict liability, should be applied. 

Under the negligence rule, injurers are liable for damages caused by their behavior only if they don t exercise due care, and victims are responsible for other damages. Under strict liability with contributory negligence, the opposite is true injurers are responsible for all damages unless the victims did not exercise due care. Under strict liability, injurers are responsible for all damages their products cause, period. 

Accidents in which victims care levels do not affect the severity of damages are called unilateral accidents. In those accidents, strict liability creates incentives for an optimal level of damages. The costs... 

Accidents in which care levels of both firms and customers affect damages are called bilateral accidents. Strict liability with contributory negligence will efficiently manage risks in bilateral accidents if customers are aware of the courts due-care standard. Under strict liability with contributory negligence, consumers must engage in precautions that the court determines are cost-effective. The damages that remain after that level of care is taken are the firm s responsibility. This increases product prices and reduces purchases, an important method of accident control (Shavell 1987, 54). 

Landes and Posner (1987, 287, 295-96) argue that strict liability is appropriate when information is asymmetrically available (e.g., firms have it and consumers do not) because the product is technologically sophisticated (e.g., synthetic organic chemicals). Efficiency is served by strict liability for two reasons. First, firms can discover innovations that reduce the damages from technologically sophisticated products at a lower cost than consumers because firms usually have better access to scientific knowledge. Second, risks that cannot be eliminated cost-effectively raise product prices, which reduces sales and reduces damages. 

Both Negligence and Strict Liability Have Been Inefficient... 

Strict liability has some unique potential problems. It makes firms entirely responsible for developing knowledge, and it forms risksharing pools by product rather than by customer. 

The strict-liability rule assigns fo firms fhe cosfs of residual risks that cannot be cost-effectively eliminated given current information. In turn, firms often have a strong incentive to find, act upon, and disseminate information that lowers their damage costs (or insurance rates), unless they can avoid their liability obligations as described earlier. 

Although strict liability appears to serve efficiency because product prices rise to reflect firms responsibility for the aggregate level of damages, efficiency is realized only if consumers do not vary in their care or activity levels (or care and lower activity levels do not... 

Strict liability is efficient only when firms can do a great deal to reduce their product risks and consumers cannot. The negligence rule becomes more appropriate as consumer behavior increasingly affects damages, firm behavior decreasingly affects damages, and knowledge about products becomes more widespread. How do the facts about chemicals relate to such institutional demands ... 

Strict liability pools risks by product negligence pools risks by customers. In the case of chemicals, the inefficiencies created by product-specific rather than customer-based insurance vary from product to product. Whereas cancer risks from drinking chlorinated water probably do not vary among users even when care levels differ, cancer risks to infants whose parents spray insecticides on tomato plants probably differ greatly depending on whether the infants are upwind or downwind of the spraying. 

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