Sen. Warren: make American business more European is a post from Overlawyered - Chronicling the high cost of our legal system

Free speech runs into deeper trouble in Europe is a post from Overlawyered - Chronicling the high cost of our legal system

How to revive blasphemy law in just a few easy steps is a post from Overlawyered - Chronicling the high cost of our legal system

Medical roundup is a post from Overlawyered - Chronicling the high cost of our legal system

Free speech roundup is a post from Overlawyered - Chronicling the high cost of our legal system

…scientists have now discovered that too much of the most commonly used type of cinnamon, cassia, can cause liver damage thanks to high levels of coumarin, a natural ingredient found in the spice.

The EU has accordingly decreed that coumarin levels must be kept below 50 mg per kg in “traditional” or “seasonal” foodstuffs eaten only occasionally, and 15 mg per kg in everyday “fine baked goods.”

Last month, the Danish food authority ruled that the nation’s famous cinnamon swirls were neither traditional nor seasonal, thus limiting the quantity of cinnamon that bakers are allowed to use, placing the pastry at risk – and sparking a national outcry that could be dubbed the great Danish bake strop.

The president of the Danish Bakers’ Association, Hardy Christensen, said: “We’ve been making bread and cakes with cinnamon for 200 years. Then suddenly the government says these pastries are not traditional? I have been a baker for 43 years and never come across anything like this – it’s crazy. Using lower amounts of the spice will change the distinctive flavour and produce less tasty pastries. Normally, we do as we’re told by the government and say OK, but now it’s time to take a stand. Enough is enough.”

Meanwhile: Anonymous informant shuts down school bus cookie lady in Minneapolis suburb of Chanhassen, Minn. [MPR, AP]

Health and safety regulators vs. Danish pastry is a post from Overlawyered - Chronicling the high cost of our legal system

February 17 roundup is a post from Overlawyered - Chronicling the high cost of our legal system

Free speech roundup is a post from Overlawyered - Chronicling the high cost of our legal system

August 26 roundup is a post from Overlawyered - Chronicling the high cost of our legal system

It fascinates me how other cultures tolerate risk and reject idiot-proofing so much differently than the US. I wonder which way the causal arrow goes with the general litigiousness of American culture: are we litigious because we’re risk-averse, or are we risk-averse because we’re litigious? If the former, perhaps the European example actually reflects the moral hazard of social insurance. (Of course, other photos on the travelogue pages demonstrate other important differences between Denmark and the US.)

Related: Subcontinental Drift on zoos in Southeast Asia.

Update: Amusement-park-loving torts prof Bill Childs comments, which is appropriate, because the post was originally just going to be an email to Childs and a handful of other people before I realized there was no reason not to just expand it into a post.

And another update: a reader writes me to say “Maybe the lawyers in Europe might wake up and start trolling for injured plaintiffs as a result of your posting.” Which might just be the hint to the answer to my question of the causal arrow: we’re litigious because the American system creates incentives to “troll for injured plaintiffs” in a way that the European legal system does not—yet. The perverse incentives for American lawyers in turn create distorted incentives to businesses and consumers, which in turn likely make us less safe because of overwarning leaving us oblivious to obvious risk. Irrational risk-aversion isn’t unique to the US; we see invocation of the “precautionary principle” in Europe frequently.

Of course, risk-aversion may just be a luxury good. In other words, people may just prefer a certain level of irrationality in risk preferences, in which case Americans have more of it, because, as a wealthier society, we can more easily afford to bear the costs of the additional frictions it causes, just as we can more easily afford SUVs. Of course, it doesn’t help to have special interest groups for whom billions of dollars in wealth-transfers rides if Americans start to change their mind about risk-aversion; trial lawyers cater to it, to be sure, but so do many mainstream product advertisers and politicians.

Quasi-off-topic musing is a post from Overlawyered - Chronicling the high cost of our legal system