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Economy
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Regulation, but by Whom?
Centralized Power, whether Public or Private, is the Problem
Transparency, De-centralization, and Private Regulation is the Solution
Government regulation is the new hue and cry. It is suddenly presented in the media and on both sides of the aisle in our legislatures as the cure-all for everything.
It might surprise you, but we agree. We say regulation, of course! We just disagree about who should be doing it. If
there is one lesson America continues to fail to learn it is that
centralized power cannot be trusted. Whether that centralized power is
in government, banks, corporations, or some other entity, if it is
concentrated, it is dangerous.
Individual liberty, local autonomy,
economic freedom, any sort of freedom or empowerment for the masses and the local communities, decreases and
diminishes in direct correlation to the degree to which power is
centralized and concentrated. Therefore, we seem to swing from one end
of the pendulum to the other. We swing from trusting the government too
much to trusting big business too much. We should fear both the
Treasury and Wall Street, the halls of Congress and the Board rooms.
Regulation is only as effective as it is fairly and evenly applied. It's not the lack of regulation that brought our economy down, it's uneven, unfairly applied regulation. It's winks and nods. It's preference and privilege. It's the abuse of centralized power. Wall Street and Pennsylvania Avenue were co-conspirators or at least negligent collaborators in the mess we have inherited. Regulations on the books were not enforced equally and evenly. Powers available already to regulators and legislators were not used, or were circumvented.
If there is greater transparency there is less need for regulation. Transparency lets everyone know what's really going on, and by whom. Big government and big business have both proven they are unable to regulate themselves or each other. Depending on the day, one of them is the fox. The other is the hen house.
We advocate a combination of transparency and private regulation as the solution to the problem. There are numerous examples in our society and economy citizen or consumer based regulating bodies and watchdog groups. A combination of a regulatory system run by private investors, consumers, citizens, etc. and complete transparency (or as close as we can come to "complete") is the only solution that will prevent a future situation such as this from reoccurring.
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