Profits are too high. America needs a giant dose of competition

Re:Profits are too high. America needs a giant dose of compe... by DanielBMarkham on Tuesday March 29, 2016 @06:19AM (#11380521)

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.

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Re:Profits are too high. America needs a giant dose of compe... by adrianratnapala on Tuesday March 29, 2016 @07:26AM (#11380699)

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.

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Re:Profits are too high. America needs a giant dose of compe... by DanielBMarkham on Tuesday March 29, 2016 @08:22AM (#11380908)

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.

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Re:Profits are too high. America needs a giant dose of compe... by coldtea on Tuesday March 29, 2016 @06:42AM (#11380583)

>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.

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