Is the Culinary Institute of America liable when one of its instructors injures a child in a traffic accident while driving home from work? “An employer is vicariously liable, irrespective of fault, for the tortious conduct of its employees within the scope of their employment,” an appellate court in California has written. “This doctrine is based on a deliberate allocation of a risk. The losses caused by the torts of employees, which as a practical matter are sure to occur in the conduct of the employer’s enterprise, are placed upon that enterprise itself, as a required cost of doing business.” This is intended to shift the burdens from the innocent victim to the employer, who can absorb...