The waiting time could be due to government agencies being overloaded due to shortages of personnel, but hiring more people costs money and people wouldn't like

The waiting time could be due to government agencies being overloaded due to shortages of personnel, but hiring more people costs money and people wouldn't like taxes to go up. Also consider this: petrochem companies would have an easier time if they were allowed to dump waste into rivers instead of having to jump hurdles to process it properly. That doesn't mean that environmental regulation is bad and we should do away with it to let them innovate more.