Neoliberal

I just think this is leaning too much into how things should work in theory and not why things are the way they are in practice. There are many situations where we need people to be willing to take risks, and one of the ways we can encourage that is to provide protection from liability. I worry this would only disincentivize people from taking necessary risks.

Just using the architecture/engineering/construction (AEC) industry as an example, increasing the personal liability of the employee could lead to a drop in productivity because of what is at stake if there is a mistake, and mistakes are unavoidable in the AEC industry. 

Limited Liability Companies (LLCs) are very popular and were explicitly set up to limit the personal liability and provide personal asset protection for all members against debts (business or personal), legal claims, etc. so that if something happened - or a major mistake were made - the owner and employees would only risk their company assets (should they have them) and have their personal assets legally protected; they wouldn’t lose everything they own. If the mistake is large enough, they can still lose their right to practice their chosen trade, but that wouldn’t come from a government authority (in the case of architects and engineers, whoever signed and sealed the drawing set could lose their license).

Corporations are similar in this regard, only the company is owned by shareholders which also makes it easier to transfer ownership. In the case of publicly traded corporations, we would also have stockholders and who are not necessarily even employees. In principle, corporations take advantage of this to raise fund when they are undergoing risky ventures.

This is in contrast to a sole proprietorship where the owner has much more individual control but risks losing their business and personal assets if there is a large enough mistake.

Basically, what I’m getting at is many of the systems we have put in place already exist to limit the personal risk to ones livelihood, and spreading around the liability for decision making may not be a good thing or something people necessarily want. Increasing personal risk could actually be a disincentive for people to be willing to work in certain industries. (And given the housing shortage in the US, the AEC industry is not one we want to slow down).

If certain companies want to run their business in a more democratic fashion, then all the power to them. I would be curious to see how they would contractually spread around the liability for decision making or how they might defend themselves in a legal setting; both would be necessary before it becomes a standard for any industry.