[Mr. Adventure]

The ratings we've had up to now contain way too much marketing and not nearly enough engineering, and I agree with you that it's pretty goofy for manufacturers to advertise the tow vehicle payload as part of the tow capacity. Starting with the 2013 models, there are supposed to be new tow ratings that follow industry standards. Hopefully, this will result in good standards of comparison for consumers plus better and safer tow vehicles as well. However, it is my guess that these ratings will evolve slowly and that they may never properly appreciate the low center of gravity and lack of sway in our folding TrailManors.

Also, to your fears about negligence, I've done a lot of Internet searches, and never found a single case that seems to identify an RV loading condition as being the cause of an accident (except for the European youtube video, of course). Those legal terms you are using have specific standards of proof, and there's not much Google evidence that they have been applied in an RV context. There are some cases of improper hitching, and it's not hard to find more general "failure to maintain control of a motor vehicle" references. There are only a couple loss-of-control TrailManor accidents reported in this forum, which must collectively represent thousands of TM-years of experience.

(Parargraphs added)
Negligence is the primary ingredient of most accidents, and the possibility of accidents is why we carry insurance. In the case of simple property damage, they work it out as to whose insurance company is going to pay in a process most of us have had to deal with one way or another. Liability is a lot more fun for the lawyers when there is personal injury involved, and their work is all over the Internet these days as they try to make themselves sound like rocket scientists going on about how to get a lot of money when you are injured.

Their websites tell a lot about their business practices: Paragraph 1 tells about how great it is to own a recreational vehicle. Paragraph 2 is a lecture on how dealers sell these patently dangerous vehicles to unqualified drivers without checking them out or doing any training, just to make money. Paragraph 3 is the caption for the terrible accident video. Paragraph 4 lists all the possible ways for lawyers to insinuate liabilities upon other lawyer's clients that go all the way from a detached trailer to a cracked turn signal reflector, and yes, they wouldn't hesitate to subpoena your owners manual and the drivers' side doorpost placard if they thought it could be helpful for inflaming a jury. With the greedy trial lawyers and the juries that think this is all just like television, it seems pretty crazy out there. The only defenses against liability are careful driving and a good insurance policy. I wouldn't buy one for an RV that I didn't study carefully, particularly the section called "Exclusions".

I fault no one for errors on the side of safety, so long as it isn't an excuse for complacency while towing.