State regulation of doctors, Commodity Futures Trading Commission rules for derivatives, and local land-use planning decisions rarely if ever occur to citizens and policymakers as having anything to do with the larger social debate about inequality. If the case is made effectively — if policymakers do start seeing these diverse policies as part of a larger problem — then it would be possible to generate political conflict in arenas that are currently too quiet and uncontested. This happened in the 1970s and 1980s when policymakers connected regulatory capture in areas like trucking and airlines to widespread concern with inflation. It could happen again if policymakers across the spectrum start to believe that rent-seeking, in all its forms, is deeply implicated in the problem of inequality.
Pointer from Mark Thoma.
But are other progressives willing to concede that government intervention in markets has such adverse consequences?
“But are other progressives willing to concede that government intervention in markets has such adverse consequences?”
Maybe, but probably not. On the one hand, the Obama admin just warned of the dangers of unnecessary occupational licensing. On the other hand, when I google for this, nearly all the results for news reports are from libertarian or conservative leaning sites. Nothing at all even from ABC, NBC, CNN, NY Times, etc:
https://goo.gl/vJOR2J
Left-leaning sites didn’t seem to criticize the report (not wanting to bash the Obama admin) so they seem to have just ignored it. I had to go through a lot of pages of results before this one popped up:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/hilary-gowins/why-the-white-house-is-op_b_7913774.html
And notably there are no comments on the article.
Certainly not. So the trick is to find something else to blame to justify a policy shift. And we can already guess what that’s going to be: various kinds of group representational disparities in licensed occupations, creating a barrier to entry for the historically excluded groups.
Probably when libertarians concede government non intervention can lead to the same, that is, government acts through non action as much as action as it is the mileau in which markets act.
Well, no, we clearly have no impact on progressives.
And no, things aren’t symmetrical. Government inaction is not equal and opposite of an action. This is easier to show (than the converse) because of how dismal government action is. If you want to prevent violent crime, you put up with government inefficiency. But if you want to stop drug use or loosie cigarette sales the asymmetry becomes more evident. It’s hard for government to stop a market, for example. Realistic policy should take things like this into consideration.
From my point of view, the idea that libertarians think markets are perfect is usually a straw man used to cover progressives desire for magical government thinking. For example, we didn’t say financial markets using government manipulated money would be perfect, we just don’t think the Dodd-Frank is going to work.
> But are other progressives willing to concede that government intervention in markets has such adverse consequences?
But s Steve Teles even a progressive? I’d be surprised, given *National Affairs* lineage — Irving Kristol, Kissinger, Charles Murray, etc.
A couple of points:
Local land use zoning is widely viewed as a frequent impediment to inequality, i.e – snob zoning.
While I would agree with the premise that such regulations can contribute to inequality, the underlying problems wouldn’t just disappear. We’d likely be complaining about the courts instead of the regulators.