Government Regulation

What is the difference between the Bay Area’s 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake, in which 63 people died; northwestern Turkey’s 1999 İzmit earthquake, in which 17,000 people died; and southern Haiti’s 2010 earthquake, in which a quarter of a million people are feared to have died?  The answer is building codes.

In the US building codes exist, and they’re enforced.  In Turkey they exist–kind of–but a few bucks in the right hands can make them go away pretty quickly.  In Haiti there are no building codes whatsoever.”