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In the T. Steinberg’s reading about the Earthquake and Fire in San Francisco of 1906, Steinberg makes the argument that people see the disaster as more of a fire than an earthquake. He argue that businessmen insisted that it was just a fire because they believed it would affect their economic growth. Capitalists feared that any talk about earthquake would make others with economic interest in California take their money elsewhere. Steinberg also argues that the insurance companies were regretful in saying that there was an earthquake because it was seen as something that they were obligated to pay. Whereas the fire, they could pay but a substantial amount of money for the damages.
I think that another important argument made was that there was a social class distinction between those affected by means of who gets more or less money. For example, they created buildings in floors that were just filled in with mud and were indeed prone to seismic activity. As @armando35 said, “Steinberg points out that when a disaster strikes the people who take the brunt of the force are the underprivileged”. These buildings were located in ghettos and they would be paid even the slightest minimum when these earthquakes. the fire was emphasized more because they did not want people to think that earthquakes would make their investments lessened and people would be more fearful and think that california was prone to earthquakes. in reality it is today and it is interesting to see how earthquakes had been happening a long time ago.