Richard Epstein, the libertarian legal scholar and author of such classics as The Case Against the Employee Free Choice Act and Forbidden Grounds: The Case Against Employment Discrimination Laws, has helpfully chimed into the discussion about the Rana Plaza garment factory collapse in Bangladesh that killed over 1100 people so far by zeroing in on who’s really to blame: the workers.

Specifically, those workers who have been pushing for better conditions at factories such as Rana Plaza:

Ironically, that labor agitation was itself one of the contributing causes to the collapse at Rana Plaza. Quite simply, the occurrence of such disruptions — and the threat of future ones — places enormous strains on the firms that have to deliver goods to foreign purchasers in order to remain in business. The threat of a repeat protest has led many firm bosses to step up the pace of work in the factories, which in turn means longer shifts, more workers, more extensive use of heavy equipment in order to make up for lost production, and stockpiling goods. That maneuver turned into a fatal insurance policy against future labor disruptions.