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It seems that in the US there has been a trend to "de-regulate" or let businesses regulate themselves. It works for a while, but eventually it seems to go sout

It seems that in the US there has been a trend to "de-regulate" or let businesses regulate themselves. It works for a while, but eventually it seems to go south. I think "regulatory capture" is the term. I think of Boeing being allowed to inspect there own planes.. I think drug manufactures submit there own studies, as the FDA doesn't have a budget to test all the things themselves. The opiod manufactures are organized too. They have trade groups and conferences.

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marcuskane2 2y ago
De-regulation and regulatory capture are almost opposite things. De-regulation is a solution to the problem of regulatory capture. Regulatory capture is a central problem in America today. The big powerful entities- major corporations, large unions, special interest groups, etc have the time, resources and incentives to lobby for laws (regulations) to be written in their favor. The result is the American public is very heavily regulated, but in ways that are beneficial primarily to the powerful incumbents. This spans everything from copyright law favoring big hollywood studios to USDA regulations favoring the handful of major meat producer corporations to medicine, manufacturing, retail, real estate, etc. Regulatory capture is also why the divide between leftists saying more regulation and rightists saying less regulation are both often missing the real problem. The US already has millions of lines of text for regulation, the problem is that so much of the regulation is bad and written to favor whoever donated or could sway votes to whichever representative crafted the language.
jimbob45 2y ago
Arguably, you have it backwards. Self-regulation doesn't work for a while, and then it works ultra well. Boeing got away with poor self-regulation for decades but now their business almost certainly will implode within decades and their market position will be taken over by those who were willing and able to self-regulate. They were rightfully punished and the US government was (theoretically) able to spend more resources regulating elsewhere. That said, the lag time between the beginning of failing to self-regulate and the beginning of consequences showing up are likely too far apart to make it a sound doctrine for the US government.

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marcuskane2 2y ago

De-regulation and regulatory capture are almost opposite things. De-regulation is a solution to the problem of regulatory capture. Regulatory capture is a central problem in America today. The big powerful entities- major corporations, large unions, special interest groups, etc have the time, resources and incentives to lobby for laws (regulations) to be written in their favor. The result is the American public is very heavily regulated, but in ways that are beneficial primarily to the powerful incumbents. This spans everything from copyright law favoring big hollywood studios to USDA regulations favoring the handful of major meat producer corporations to medicine, manufacturing, retail, real estate, etc. Regulatory capture is also why the divide between leftists saying more regulation and rightists saying less regulation are both often missing the real problem. The US already has millions of lines of text for regulation, the problem is that so much of the regulation is bad and written to favor whoever donated or could sway votes to whichever representative crafted the language.

jimbob45 2y ago

Arguably, you have it backwards. Self-regulation doesn't work for a while, and then it works ultra well. Boeing got away with poor self-regulation for decades but now their business almost certainly will implode within decades and their market position will be taken over by those who were willing and able to self-regulate. They were rightfully punished and the US government was (theoretically) able to spend more resources regulating elsewhere. That said, the lag time between the beginning of failing to self-regulate and the beginning of consequences showing up are likely too far apart to make it a sound doctrine for the US government.