From: schuldy@zariski.harvard.edu (Mark Schuldenfrei)
Message-Id: <9403151739.AA29027@math.harvard.edu>
Subject: Re: insurance
To: jeffs@math.bu.edu (Jeff Suzuki)
Date: Tue, 15 Mar 1994 12:39:23 -0500 (EST)
Cc: carolingia@world.std.com
In-Reply-To: <9403151658.AA04833@math.bu.edu> from "Jeff Suzuki" at Mar 15, 94 11:58:17 am
Content-Type: text
Content-Length: 2429      

With Fuji's stuff, where to begin?  It has little to do with the realities
of business.  I strongly suggest any book or two on business management to
folks who want to speculate in this arena: it would cut the blue-skying down
to a reasonable level.

  I do question Alex's insurance figures --- they seem high, so I'd be
  interested in seeing the details, especially in comparison with hard
  figures for exactly what SCA Inc. insurance covers.  

Go, and call around yourself.  He is roughly correct, from what I
understand.  Remember, Alex has actually done this sort of thing, and is
a professional Executive Director for a living, as well as running at least
two other businesses that I know of.
  
  1)  We can make a good case for getting local event insurance for the
  	same per person rate that we are getting it currently.  We can
  	argue that we are smaller and run fewer events than the
  	National group, so our risk is correspondingly less.

How, please?  That is not how the insurance industry works.
  
  2)  Why do we need insurance, if a legal fiction will work?
  	Suppose we create a Barony of Carolingia Inc.  Then the
  	autocrats, etc., get named as employees of the corporation.
  	Now if anything happens, it is the corporation that gets sued,
  	and except in cases of gross negligence (which I think would
  	be hard to prove) the autocrats, etc., would be untouchable.
  	(Even in the cases of gross negligence: how many times has the
  	person directly responsible, due to drugs or alcohol, for an
  	industrial accident gotten off with being fired, while the 
  	company is embroiled in a million dollar lawsuit?)

WHere do I begin. You can't just "name" employees. You have to pay them a
salary, SSI, withhold taxes, provide work locations, and so forth. There are
elaborate mechanisms in law for determining when an employee is a real
employee, for precisely the reasons you are alluding to: it absolves of
responsiblity.

Calling a tail a leg does not make it one.

  	Plus you have the argument, "Well, they only have $1500 in
  	their Corporate bank account and no million dollar policy.
  	Most of that will get eaten up by legal fees, so if they offer
  	to settle out of court --- do it."

That is EXACTLY the reason that sites with a clue want to proof of insurance
before they will rent the property.  Yes, there are sites that don't have a
clue.  How long before they get one?

	Tibor