Most of us didn’t know until we read the Detroit Freep on Memorial Day that there is such a thing as an ' I’m Sorry Law’. Before you get excited thinking that your garage mechanic is getting into the eating humble pie business when he screws up your brakes this bit of legislation is for doctors only. Michigan, it seems, is only one of 15 states without extra protection for physicians who apologize for something bad that happened to a patient they were treating. It seems that doctors who apologize have been able to reduce the costs of malpractice claims by a whopping 40%.
That explains everything. All this while I thought some doctors were just arrogant. Without the new law and in some convoluted way saying your sorry by a doctor to a patient or his family is an admission of guilt and could be used against them in court. With the new law in place saying you’re sorry can’t be used as an admission and theoretically saves the malpractice insurance carrier bokoo dollars.
Folks used to apology if they did something unintentionally that discomforted or inconvenienced another. People don’t do a lot of that anymore. Usually a rude gesture is what you get or an invitation to step outside, even if you happen to be outside.
Apologies are usually forthcoming, especially in criminal trials, after someone is found guilty of doing something bad and just before sentencing. You expect apologies right about then and at the same time distrust them because you just don’t know how earnest someone is who’s just been found guilty. It’s not so much as saying ‘I’m Sorry’ as it is the ‘Don’t Send Me Away For Life’.
The folks in the oil business are probably on the same page as Michigan doctors and not in the apologizing mood when they do something wrong. We saw this on television as it was ‘Pass The Buck’ and ‘Blame Them Not Me’ before a Congressional hearing on the BP disaster. BP could apologize to the moon and back and still folks know they’re guilty of a lot of things.
Some people in the investment business who threw a monkey wrench into the global economy are not forthcoming with apologies anytime soon. GS is being sued for fraud and doesn’t say it’s sorry but stands on its hind legs and proudly proclaims it did nothing wrong. They allegedly sold products that just about everyone, except the buyer, knew was a pile of crap. Instead of, ‘We shouldn’t have done that.’, the order of the day was, ‘The buyer should have known better.’
AIG , the giant insurance company, was kept in business and used taxpayer’s money to pay their insurance claims to keep banks and brokerage houses in business and no one said they were sorry. There was no one that stood up and said, ‘Thank you,’ either.
What they did do was say they needed more bonuses and more money to pay certain executives because these were the only people who knew how to fix what they did wrong. My question is if they knew how to fix it why did they screw it up in the first place?
People and institutions make mistakes all the time. We all can understand how accidents happen. When something that is supposed to have redundant checks and procedures to minimize accidents and all of them are either ignored or minimized then what happens as a result is not an accident.
Do something once and it’s an accident or misfortune. The second time could be coincidence but the third means that this is now a habit.
There isn’t a day that goes by that each of us isn’t exposed or makes a mistake that we expect or offer to rectify. We get the wrong change, someone gives us the wrong size, the DVD doesn’t format, the shirt shrank, someone put mayo when we asked for plain. We say, opps, we’re sorry and fix it.
Regulators and elected officials haven’t stepped up and said they’re sorry about the mortgage mess. Unless they were living in caves during one of the biggest mortgage giveaways in American history, both regulators and elected officials had to know that people were getting homes and money they couldn’t afford nor qualify for. Excuse me for reminding folks but back in the day it seems you couldn’t turn on the TV, radio or internet without someone shoving a fistful of money at you. And, folks in Washington, DC didn’t think any of that rather strange? Or, were elected officials so blasé about having money tossed at them that they figured it happened to everyone?
It wasn’t as if this game show with houses for prizes only happened for a day or two. This was a continuous systematic fraud that was being perpetuated against the American people and against certain government agencies for years. And no one steps up and says, ‘I’m sorry?’
Now it doesn’t matter. After reading the Freep I realize that saying ‘I’m Sorry’, simply means that I hope you cut me a break and only sue me for half of what you were originally contemplating. It’s a ruse, a way of doing business, it doesn’t mean much at all.
If you have questions call Paul at 877 783 7080 or write him at pstanley@westminsterfinancial.com. Share this blog with someone who cares about their money.
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