Yup, companies want regulation that isn't onerous for them. There's a big problem today in how the public talks about regulation, generally it's a very unsophisticated talk about the amount of regulation. This is like talking about programming in the form of SLOC, it's practically useless. The problem with regulation is making it effective, efficient (in terms of costs incurred by the government and by those being regulated), and not onerous. Unfortunately, in many cases we've missed the mark on all three of those. The result is that regulation sometimes actively drives out competition (because it's streamlined for the megacorps) while not being nearly effective enough to protect those it's intended to protect (consumers, workers, etc.)

After working in the banking industry writing regulatory software, I realize that these regulations, while sometimes needed, can often be a way to keep other rivals out. There is no way a smaller bank can handle some of these without teams of hundreds.

Same in medical. It's too hard for startups to bring something to market so the big guys just wait to buy them up. And they like it that way.

> You can go hundreds of years back and companies and businesses were already then busy at pushing through special privileges to keep their profits high.

Guilds are probably the prime example. Government-enforced cartels established by the industries to keep up prices for centuries.

>I think it is a myth that all companies want is light regulation and the evil guvmint comes in an cover them in red tape.

Oh, I agree. My point is once you set up a powerful regulatory apparatus the companies involved are going to capture it, or at least try to.

You need regulations, and you need regulators. But too much regulation is bad for consumers, because once it reaches a certain complexity only the insiders understand what's going on.

I don't disagree here, but I am concerned you may be overstating your point.

Regulation is rarely a case of being good or bad. Rather, various competing interests have valid points and some arbitration must be found between them. As the old saying goes (paraphrased), politics is about slogans. Governance is about choices.

Political systems exist for political purposes. So what happens over time in a democracy is that regulations that sound good get enacted while regulations that don't sound good are not. In addition, regulations are enacted that sound good even in cases that may not require any regulation at all.

To fix this, politicians use cartoonish slogans -- "all government is bad" or "we need somebody to protect us from corporations"

This response, while great for the political system, does nothing to address the underlying bug in the regulatory system.

It's good that this thread is pointing to quality rather than quantity of regulation -- but remember that "we" (i.e. voters and chattering internet posters) have no control over the making of regulation.

What we have some control over, is the process that makes regulation. And a process that makes it easy and convenient, will be easy and convenient for the insiders who work it.

Yes, agreed. Just trying to clear the field of all the straw men. I believe if folks can grasp why it doesn't work like that, they've got a better chance of working out how it might work. Otherwise we're still in slogan territory.

>Regulation is rarely a case of being good or bad. Rather, various competing interests have valid points and some arbitration must be found between them.

A lot of the time it's just plain bad -- just the result of monetary influence and lobbying for unfair advantages.

I think the Tea Party story has nothing to do with companies wanting light regulation. The story is that "evil guvmint" enables the big boys in the private sector to seal up their industry with red tape. It matters little whether the government folks or company bosses gain more from the deal.

And that story is about making it harder to regulate. If regulations are technocratic decisions made according to vague or ever-changing rules, then lots of cosy deals are going to be done.

The recent Tesla cases are examples of small companies trying to prevent their larger suppliers from making them obsolete.

A lot of anti-competitive law in the US is not "big vs small". Many of the biggies are small vs small or even small vs big - occupational licensing, exclusionary zoning, agricultural laws, lots of state level regulations designed to protect (not very large) incumbents.

Sadly protectionism is a widespread plague that doesn't fit any easy narratives.

How about "old vs. new"? That fits Tesla (who are trying to disrupt old auto maker markets). That fits other scenarios that I've seen like, say, large media companies trying to use streaming Internet royalty rates to drive small streaming stations out of business... or (here in Florida) large brewery distributors attempting to prevent direct brewery sales from microbreweries.

It is a disease, and it won't go away until everyone stops playing the game of trying to legislate competitive advantage. Some of the worst complainers about protectionism unfortunately are the biggest players. Example: I remember when Gibson complained about their factories being raided, reportedly for using illegal timber (an environmental regulation that some also view as protectionism courtesy of the Pacific Northwest timber industry). It got a lot of press, but my initial reaction was one of schadenfreude. Because Gibson was notorious for playing their own "protectionism" game courtesy of a lot of dubious patent / copyright lawsuits on various competitors (eg Paul Reed Smith, Warmoth, Elderly), virtual rock band games (Guitar Hero and Rock Band), Paper Jamz guitars, and probably others I can't recall at the time.

Those not very large groups have very substantial lobbying efforts.

I don't dispute that. And they aren't necessarily small groups in aggregate - e.g., auto dealers are a large collection of small businesses.

I.e. that's a large number of small political donors in your state (highly motivated to donate to your opponents) vs one big corp in another state, plus of course rationally ignorant consumer/voters.