Not necessarily. An obvious conflict of interest would be someone who has a significant financial stake in the industry, or someone who is married to a CEO in that industry, etc.
Also consider this: who is actually qualified to regulate an industry? It is often the case that the only qualified candidates are people who have worked in the industry or who have worked against it (which is just as much of a conflict of interest). Someone who is clueless could be worse: they could be more susceptible to lobbying pressure, since they have no prior knowledge of the issues they are dealing with.
In theory the job of the Senate should be to determine whether or not a candidate will be able to serve the public instead of their former industry bosses. Such people definitely exist -- Tom Wheeler is a prominent example. We also have an impeachment procedure to deal with the possibility of failure i.e. the possibility of the Senate confirming a regulator who fails to serve the public; by now there is ample evidence that confirming Pai was a mistake, but with today's hyper-partisan Congress there is not much hope for impeachment.
Off the top of my head, economists and lawyers?
I don't think you need first-hand experience in an industry to regulate it. We need experts in regulation that can take input from industry and consider the public perspective.
I'm not convinced it's possible to have a career in a field and not have your opinion tainted by that experience. This is why neither industry insiders or opponents should be responsible for regulation.
Sure. In the abstract. But in practicality, it doesn't pass the smell test. Just like if I committed a crime and my mother was judge of the case, there isn't anything specifically wrong with it. But there are potential issues of conflict of interest and she should probably recuse herself from the case.
> in fact, good regulation should include the input of the regulated industries (failure to do so was a causative factor in the bankruptcy of railroads in the 60s and 70s).
Of course regulatory agencies need input from the industry. But there is a difference between providing input and leading the agency. I'm all for input. I'm not too keen on former Directors, CEOs, etc of banks, ISPs, etc leading agencies that regulate those companies. Especially when we have people going back and forth between regulatory agencies and companies.
If you have an ex-Verizon person they shouldn’t have any loyalty to the company. If they do, then there would be a conflict of interest.
Yes, and people should be good at all times and not lie.
Remember that Wheeler was a former cable industry lobbyist. Unlike Pai, he actually listened to non-industry voices during his proceeding and created rules based on inputs from many different sources. He did not give net neutrality advocates everything we wanted, but he did listen and did create something much better than what the industry has been demanding.