09/10/2026
This is what AI thinks I’d look like practicing law in 1969—the year I was born.
OK. We all know I wasn’t practicing law then. I had other things going on. Like figuring out how to get fed and get my diaper changed.
But not long after I was born, Ford introduced the Pinto.
Most of you reading this probably never heard of this engineering marvel Ford unleashed on an unsuspecting public.
Read on. It seems nuts, but it’s true.
The Ford Pinto had a fuel tank located behind the rear axle. In rear-end crashes, the tank could be damaged, fuel could leak, and the car could catch fire.
But, what made the story infamous wasn’t simply that the car had a dangerous design. Through litigation, evidence came out about what Ford knew about the problem, the risk, and the relatively low cost of possible design changes that could make the car safer. But they didn’t make the design changes before putting Pintos on the road. They kept producing the cars, selling the cars, and accepting the risk to others.
Yeah. Seriously.
And eventually, juries got to weigh in too.
The world was simpler back then, for sure. But not always safer.
Hell, we rode in the back of station wagons and pickup trucks—and sitting on each other’s laps wasn’t exactly unusual.
Seatbelts? For sissies.
Half the time, I don’t think anybody even knew where the seat belts were.
A lot has changed since 1969.
Cars are safer. Seat belts are better. Airbags. Crumple zones. Backup cameras. Automatic braking. None of that was part of everyday driving when I was born.
Okay, most of it wasn’t even around when I first got my driver’s license—which could be a whole Thursday Thought of its own.
Ford was ultimately hit with a massive jury verdict in one of the most famous Pinto cases. The Pinto became a symbol of what can go wrong when the cost of safety gets weighed against the cost of people getting hurt.
People sometimes complain that lawsuits make things more expensive for everyone.
Sometimes they do.
But lawsuits also have a funny way of making companies realize that saving money by doing something dangerous can get very expensive.
And when the cost of doing something dangerous becomes greater than the cost of doing it safely, companies tend to find a way to make things safer.
And it makes me proud to do what I do—represent people who were hurt because someone else decided the risk was worth the consequences.
Katz’s Thursday Thought.
