Deregulation

Science deniers Trump put in power:

Science deniers Trump has already put in power:

...anti-regulation push is essentially a rejection of democracy. Jeremy Weinstein
Freedom from trade unions and collective bargaining means the freedom to suppress wages. Freedom from regulation means the freedom to poison rivers, endanger workers, charge iniquitous rates of interest and design exotic financial instruments. Freedom from tax means freedom from the distribution of wealth that lifts people out of poverty."  Neoliberalism – the ideology at the root of all our problems
When a regulatory agency is captured it becomes the industry's tool, overlooking errors and misdeeds, setting rules that favor the industry, and keeping out competition that might challenge the big incumbents. That's when regulatory agencies stop working for us and become pawns of the industry they were supposed to regulate. (from a memorandum quoted in Sheldon Witehouse's book 'The Scheme' pg151)
"...in the 1980's, we started pulling the threads out of the regulatory fabric, and we found ourselves back in the boom-and-bust cycle." Elizabeth Warren: A Fighting Chance.
It’s not us the government intends to liberate. It’s the asset strippers, money launderers, property developers and oligarchs on whose behalf it operates. Freedom’s Prison (2/6/2022) George Monbiot
Following the disastrous 2008 financial crisis, Republicans oddly grew more hostile to financial regulation. Disregarding how deregulation and Wall Streets recklessness had contributed heavily to the financial meltdown, Republicans chiefly blamed the crisis on government overregulation, .... Similarly, in the aftermath of the massive BP oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico in 2010, the G.O.P. backed legislation that would have weakened regulation of off shore drilling.

These peculiar stances reflect the considerable influence of a radical ideology among U.S. conservatives: free-market fundamentalism. As described by Joseph Stiglitz, a winner of the Nobel Prize in Economics, market fundamentalists believe that virtually all economic problems stem from 'big government,' regulation, and taxes.

Their staunch opposition to environmental laws is exacerbated by scepticism about climatology and modern science. Like U.S. liberals, most other Westerners take drastically more moderate or progressive positions on such issues. Exceptional America: What Divides Americans from the World and from Each Other: Mugambi Jouet
Only the most extreme market ideologues think that markets can self-regulate without state oversight. Markets need watchdogs — regulators, lawmakers, and other elements of democratic control — to keep them honest. When these watchdogs sleep on the job, then markets cease to aggregate consumer choices because those choices are constrained by illegitimate and deceptive activities that companies are able to get away with because no one is holding them to account. Cory Doctorow
if you eat meat — or, for that matter, drink water or breathe air — there’s a real sense in which Donald Trump is trying to kill you. And even if he’s turned out of office next year, for many Americans it will be too late. Paul Krugman (4/5/2019)
Stuff the GOP Wants to Regulate
...every major watchdog institution in the capital city is controlled by corporations and their lobbyists, even though the Constitution and other founding documents do not mention the word "corporation." Lobbyists, "who are not here just to look at the Washington Monument," now outnumber consumer advocates by more than 100 to one, he said: Ralph Nader quoted in Presidential Puppetry by Andrew Kreig
AMY GOODMAN: Talk overall, David Cay Johnston, about the issue of deregulation. The whole issue of regulation is one that the Republican presidential candidate raises continually about, you know, unfettered business, free enterprise, capitalism being allowed to work in this country.

DAVID CAY JOHNSTON: There is no such thing as deregulation. This is a really important issue about how the news media have not covered this well. There is only new regulation. And what we’ve done is taken rules, some of which date back thousands of years—and I teach the law of the ancient world at Syracuse University’s law school and graduate business school. We’re stripping these rules away, and we are putting in rules that say you don’t have to have any regard for your neighbor or your employees or your customers; you can do whatever will maximize your profit; it doesn’t matter that you’re putting people’s lives in danger, that you’re not supplying the services you promise, that you’re driving up prices artificially. And nobody has written about these laws. I mean, I had to spend four years reading through the most unbelievably boring material, but it was astonishing how these laws were passed with, in many cases, little or no public hearing, no journalists in the room. Sometimes even the trade press of the various industries I write about didn’t even write about these things. (from Democracy Now! )
“The test of our progress is not whether we add more to the abundance of those who have much; it is whether we provide enough for those who have too little.” - FDR

The broken US economy breeds inequality and insecurity. Here’s how to fix it (10/2/2022) The Guardian, James K Galbraith

Alex Jones and the Wellness-Conspiracy Industrial Complex (8/11/2022)

Tracking deregulation in the Trump era (8/6/2020)

Why Is Trump Gutting Regulations That Save Lives? (4/17/2020)

Trump Rule Would Exclude Climate Change in Infrastructure Planning (1/3/2020)

95 Environmental Rules Being Rolled Back Under Trump (12/21/2019)

How Government Can Root Out Regulatory Capture Sheldon Whitehouse (6/15/2016)

Yellen and Draghi oppose Trump's Financial Deregulation (8/27/2017)

Phosporous and deregulation: Paul Krugman (8/10/2014)

Carl Icahn's Failed Raid on Washington (8/28/2017)

Dewey, Cheatem & Howe (9/25/2015)

Industry influence on EPA Fracking Study (3/3/2015)

The great loss of information in the wake of the NFL concussion lawsuit settlement (9/4/2013)

Monsanto Has Taken Over the USDA (5/11/2013)

Texas fertilizer company didn't heed disclosure rules before blast (4/20/2013)

Deregulation brings train wrecks, bank failure, child labor, poor consumer protection, weak anti-trust law, lax pollution controls, weakened financial oversight,economic volatility, reduced accountability, and corruption

The Republican zeal for deregulation assured that the market would become a wrecking ball, environmental protections became ineffective, loose labor regulation threatened worker safety. The lesson is clear: when mindless deregulation occurs, consumers, workers, the public commons, and economic stability are at risk. Underlying the issue are the rights of property versus the rights of the public. Republicans mostly favor property rights. The Supreme Court, being corporatists, usually sides with them.

Still, they have not learned that markets are NOT self regulating, and that it is the job of government to see that plundering the environment, fraud, and wild speculation are not acceptable, especially since taxpayers ultimately have to take the loss.

Republicans have been keen to dismantle the automatic economic stabilizers put in place in the 1930s. They revoked the Glass-Steagle Law that protected taxpayers from speculators, and now taxpayers again are on the hook. Banks consolidated still further, so expect another crisis ...only worse. The Dodd-Frank act was designed to address the "too big to fail" problem that will ultimately be yet another burden for taxpayers, but Republicans want to roll that back also as a favor to their donor oligarchs.

Business consolidation, formerly discouraged by anti-trust law, also consolidates wealth for obscenely paid CEOs. The graduated income tax might have been a counterbalance, but it has been all but eliminated. Deadbeat Republicans refuse to pay the bills for the war adventures and tax cuts that they have put on the tab. Now many of them, the Tea Party fringe at least, are prepared to default on the debt.

Republican hypocrisy is on full display now that they have passed the Trump tax cut for the wealthy, while adding $1.5 trillion to the debt.

Across the country Republicans screamed for fiscal austerity. That has meant an inadequate stimulus program at the federal level, job cuts at every level of government, harsh new laws restricting unions from bargaining, unwillingness to participate in infrastructure improvement for highways and railroads. A lot of States like New Jersey balanced their budgets and even given tax cuts by not paying into pension funds, now they want to cut pensions. Republicans don't care about deficits when they are in office.

Republicans fought regulation, so loosened pollution rule, predatory practices and corruption have become routine.

Links

Bibliography

Captured: The Corporate Infiltration of American Democracy by Senator Sheldon Whitehouse Melanie Wachtell Stinnett

How Our Modern World Is Altering Male and Female Reproductive Development, Threatening Sperm Counts, and Imperiling the Future of the Human Race By Shanna H. Swan with Stacey Colino

Monopolized, Life in the Age of Corporate Power: David Dayen