[harimau777]

While many regulations exist due to regulatory capture, many also exist for good reasons. Notably, with the possible exception of the complicated taxes, the examples you give all have pretty obvious health and safety reasons why they exist.

I agree that we should be careful to avoid overregulation in general and regulatory capture in particular. However, even without that access to capital is likely to be a major barrier to entry to many people starting a business.

[AnthonyMouse]

> Notably, with the possible exception of the complicated taxes, the examples you give all have pretty obvious health and safety reasons why they exist.

What health and safety reason requires a 3% processing fee for credit card payments? Why is it unsafe for the proprietor to live in a room in the same structure as a restaurant in some areas, but not in other places that have different zoning?

The only thing that comes close to a health and safety issue is requiring a licensed electrician, and that's still a racket because they make it infeasible for you to get the license yourself even if you're willing to learn the material.

> I agree that we should be careful to avoid overregulation in general and regulatory capture in particular. However, even without that access to capital is likely to be a major barrier to entry to many people starting a business.

In the absence of these rules, you start a restaurant out of your home and do the work yourself and the capital you need to start out is predominantly the things you already need in order to have food and shelter. These regulations add hundreds of thousands of dollars in additional capital costs for the purpose of constraining supply so landlords and contractors and banks can extract more money.

[ryanobjc]

A restaurant out of your home presents a public health risk sadly. Foodborne illnesses are rare, because of the regulations placed on commercial food sellers.

There are likely ways we can give more latitude, but home kitchens often cannot be cleaned to the same standard as commercial kitchens just due to how they have been built.

Unfortunately in terms of "overreaching" regulations, this is the worst example: food borne illneses are very real killers, and a major risk.

Also regarding a licensed electrician, while the regulatory requirements for one may seem high - I'm not 100% sure if they are or not - electrical fires are one of the major ways structures catch fire and kill people.

Really in terms of overbearing regulations, these two actually protect lives every single day. Remember the "Ghost Ship" fire? Caused by electrical fire. Norovirus on cruise ships? Cause hospitalization and evacuation.

I'm all for minimizing regulations, but many many of them are literally written in blood, and the notion that we can wholesale relax them with no ill consequence is just not true.

[AnthonyMouse]

> A restaurant out of your home presents a public health risk sadly. Foodborne illnesses are rare, because of the regulations placed on commercial food sellers.

> home kitchens often cannot be cleaned to the same standard as commercial kitchens just due to how they have been built.

This has nothing to do with zoning rules. You're not allowed to operate a restaurant on that piece of land regardless of what kind of kitchen you have. Requiring specific materials or equipment is not the same thing as "doing this is banned here but allowed somewhere you can't afford".

> Also regarding a licensed electrician, while the regulatory requirements for one may seem high - I'm not 100% sure if they are or not - electrical fires are one of the major ways structures catch fire and kill people.

Your assumption is that the rules improve safety when it's quite the opposite. A license should be something you get by passing a licensing exam, and taking the licensing exam should be free. Anyone who knows the material gets the license, immediately, at no cost.

Instead we have apprenticeship requirements whose purpose is to constrain the supply of people who hold the license. That increases the cost of hiring a professional, which causes more work to be done by amateurs even if it's illegal, or to ignore problems because they can't afford to pay someone to fix them. Which is how you get electrical fires.

Don't confuse actual safety rules with regulatory capture protectionism that compromises safety to pad the coffers of the incumbents.

[fc417fc802]

The electrical example is particularly interesting because it's generally legal to DIY things on a house that you simultaneously own and live in. Many (not sure if all) US states even have laws preventing insurance from forbidding such (although they can generally deny coverage after the fact if the incident can be shown to stem from your DIY work).

There also exist mixed zoning areas where you can run a business that hosts customers on site out of your house.

Presumably the big differences are incentives and scale. Scale wise, more building occupants justifies more regulation. In terms of incentives, there's probably less inclination to cut corners and be reckless with a structure that your entire family lives in.

I think I'm going to blame zoning on this one long before I take issue with electrician apprenticeships.

[AnthonyMouse]

> Presumably the big differences are incentives and scale. Scale wise, more building occupants justifies more regulation.

This is the ex post facto rationalization of the rules, not the actual reason. The actual reason is that businesses are more likely to have contracted it out regardless so are less likely to oppose, and are the more lucrative customers for the license holders lobbying for the rules, whereas homeowners object more and have a larger voting block.

Notice that the rules are based on use and not occupancy. A residential multi-unit condo will have more occupants than a small business that only serves five customers at once.

Meanwhile nobody actually wants an electrical fire. The primary thing leading to shoddy workmanship is artificial supply constraints on professional work, which creates financial pressure for amateurs to covertly perform work they're not qualified to do because there aren't enough professionals and puts the professionals under time pressure because there is too much work for them to complete with that number of workers.