[AnthonyMouse]

> To compete, you really do have to cut minimum wage. You have to loosen regulations, and importantly, you have to do massive tariffs / sanctions on China for the next decade.

Part of the problem here is that the existence of some kind of universal "more regulations / less regulations" slider is an illusion. It allows the problem to be cast in partisan terms when that isn't the problem at all, because the problem isn't more or less lines of regulatory code but rather higher or lower regulatory efficiency.

Some regulations save a thousand lives at a 0.02% increase in costs. Repealing those is bad. Enacting them is good. Some regulations save two lives at a 5000% increase in cost, which could equally be saved by some less expensive regulation. Enacting those is bad. Repealing them is good.

The real problem is that politicians lack the qualifications and incentives to do this well. If good rules don't exist, then someone gets hurt and there is a call for "more rules" rather than "better rules". Politicians who don't know what they're doing pass bad rules. The bad rules cause costs to exceed what they are in China, so manufacturing moves to China. Then the local lobby for improving the rules evaporates because there are no longer local manufacturers to propose or lobby for more efficient rules, and the continued existence of those rules on the books causes no more to form.

We clearly need to throw away the existing rules -- they're not working -- the question is, how do we actually get better ones?

[readams]

The problem here -- and perhaps the main problem in all our politics -- is that large swaths of the electorate do not understand the concept of second order effects. Regulations are always good because they consider only the first order effect. That is, the goal of the regulation is usually a laudable one that everyone would support. But you have to look at the costs and unintended consequences of the regulation to really know whether it's a good idea.

This is something that eludes most people, especially among progressives.

[dv_dt]

The long term studies say our political leadership largely ignores the desires of the electorate. This make the problem more likely that our political leadership likely understands the second order effects, but ignores the long term effects chasing short term gain.

[phkahler]

They think you can legislate outcomes. The reality is they need to design a system to produce that outcome.

[Lammy]

I think many more people understand second-order effects than you imply, but I think they understand that those second-order effects hurt certain groups of Americans more than others.

[umvi]

> Some regulations save a thousand lives at a 0.02% increase in costs. Repealing those is bad. Enacting them is good. Some regulations save two lives at a 5000% increase in cost, which could equally be saved by some less expensive regulation. Enacting those is bad. Repealing them is good.

Not to get political but this reminded me of covid-19. Masks and social distancing are an obvious 0.02% increase in costs that save a thousand lives. Lockdowns and extended stay-at-home orders and shutting down businesses so that we start needing to send out trillions upon trillions of stimulus cash to keep companies and people afloat start to cross into "save 2 lives at a 5000% increase in cost" territory

[NZGumboot]

I totally agree that lockdowns are super expensive, and should only be used as a last resort, but I think you're missing the purpose of lockdowns. The purpose is not to save the lives of <however many people are dying right now>. The purpose is to bring the R number <https://www.bbc.com/news/health-52473523> below one, so that the number of sick people doesn't increase to the point where the health care system is overwhelmed (which would lead to a substantially increased death rate).

Taiwan is an example of a country that managed to eliminate covid-19 without lockdowns, so it is possible, but part of their success is likely due to the fact that the authorities acted very early to impose strict quarantine rules and contact tracing (when there were fewer than 10 new cases per day!) AFAIK every other country that has managed to eliminate community transmission has done so via lockdowns.

[slaw]

The purpose of lockdowns and other methods to fight with covid-19 was to keep old people alive for few more months.

'The observed temporary excess mortality likely arises because people in vulnerable groups die weeks or months earlier than they would otherwise, due to the timing and severity of the unusual external event.' https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2020.11.11.20229708v...

[ldng]

That is not the point and never was ! When your hospital is saturated by people that ultimately will survive but need 3 to 4 weeks to recover, you're going to die from anything but covid.

You're in a car crash? To bad hospital is saturated. You got 4th degree burn in a burning building? To bad hospital is saturated.

Do you realise that is the problem?

[slaw]

Sweden's hospitals were never saturated despite no lockdown. Italy's hospitals are saturated every flu season.

Hospitals are saturated, because we want to keep these people alive for few more months. Younger people don't need hospitalization.

You are in car crash, too bad hospitals are only admitting people with covid. This is current situation in Poland.

[ldng]

Sweden did not need lockdown because, like Asia, people there were more disciplined. Numbers show road traffic dropped significantly during the first semester : people stayed home without being ordered to. Some culture will never do that by themselves.

Youngers are less affected but some absolutely do need hospitalization. Reality is not as black or white as you're making it.

The situation is like that in Poland ... and the solution is geronticide ?

[nemothekid]

I agree with your view wrt to regulations, but doesn't the article paint a different story? I'm wondering if I understood the article wrong -

As I understand it, the US status as a global reserve currency requires us to maintain a perpetual trade deficit - other countries need dollars and we must give it to them. This is done by buying goods from overseas which has eroded our manufacturing base, as the foreign demand for the dollar is greater than the local demand (which means there is a cheaper manufacturing market).

I'm not sure what regulation you could enact here that wouldn't severely depresses other sectors as they exist today.

[AnthonyMouse]

The status as a reserve currency requires dollars to flow into other countries, but that doesn't mean it has to be in exchange for manufactured goods. Example: US individuals or businesses buy real estate or stakes in local businesses in foreign countries with US dollars, causing US dollars to flow into those countries. Rents collected from the properties or businesses are used to buy more properties or businesses rather than being extracted from the country.

[nemothekid]

Labor is likely the most plentiful asset any developing country has as well as it's a system that doesn't require much legal overhead. Manufacturing goods would be the easiest asset any country could produce - trying to own an asset in a foreign nation is an expensive endeavor that requires military might (the middle east probably being the most pertinent example). Trying to collect rents requires the maintenance of an international legal system that will rule fairly. I'm not saying it's impossible, but that manufacturing requires way less overhead to maintain.

[zozbot234]

The flip side of a current account deficit is a capital account surplus. To the extent that the informal notion of a "global reserve currency" means anything economically, that's perhaps the best description of it. Such an investment surplus would tend to improve the country's economic base over time, far more than implied by any direct effect of the trade deficit.

[tekknik]

I agree with you, but one point is (and clearly these are not accurate numbers you posted) these 0.02% cost increases add up. One regulation may only increase the cost 0.02%, but 1000 at the same industry increases it 20%. And all of them increase the cost of entry. If you increase the cost of entry, then you’ll get less competition as smaller business that could turn into flourishing enterprises simply never take off or even get started because someone in their garage can’t find a profitable path. Or afford a lawyer to explain the legal hoops you have to jump through. Recently I was quoted $10k to have a lawyer explain to me 2 points about importing liquor. The result, I didn’t start the business. This is more of a problem IMO

[specialist]

I'm adopting Michael Lewis' "market referee" rhetoric.

https://atrpodcast.com

Fused with Graeber and @dredmorbius phrasing where "deregulation" means "pro-monopoly" and "anti-competitive".

I'd like to learn more about "regulatory efficiency".

--

Law (et al) is much like source code. Technical debt, path dependencies, tooling stack, managing complexity and risk. You get the idea.

So of course there's evergreen debates about refactoring, rewrites, paradigms.

[rpier001]

I wonder if import taxation that reflects externalities (pollution) and costs that we carry to reduce suffering (child labor, minimum wage) would make a difference.

[a3camero]

Rules on paper aren’t rules in reality. Enforcement of law, and the way it’s experienced (or not) is far more important than what’s written in the law books, and the enforcement part is much less transparent, and impossible to know at the time the rule is passed.

[complexmango]

Google ‘regulatory capture’

[diryawish]

Very well put - efficient and diligent deregulation would be a great thing to see.