Eliminating Redundant Regulations and Job Growth

The Obama administration wants to eliminate redundant regulations to improve job creation.

Seems to be a bit of a long-shot to me.

Eliminating redundant regulations to spur job growth is sort of like the picking out a few grains of sand will turn the Sahara Desert into fertile farm land.

Eliminating redundant regulations is a good start in any bureaucracy but don't be so naive to think by eliminating some redundant regulations job growth will be greatly improved. The structural problems this country has are just too messed up.

Don't be fooled into believing the only reason businesses aren't hiring is because of too many regulations. Businesses may complain about regulations but the bottom line is that they just don't have enough customers. Whatever regulatory concerns businesses may have would be overcome if businesses were more worried about keeping up with customer demand and the resulting increased positive cash-flow.

(Below is a comment I posted on a related, Marketplace.org news article with a few, afterthought revisions)

Equating the elimination of redundant regulations to an increase in job creation is a stretch. Just like giving multinational corporations tax breaks for bringing their foreign profits back to the US was supposed to spur job growth. The corporations claimed they would use the repatriated money to create more jobs but instead they funneled most of the money back into their own company stock.

Setting that aside, eliminating redundant regulations to reduce paperwork and confusion is a good thing so long as it doesn't weaken the protections and safe guards those redundant regulations provide.

Redundant regulations were built into our property rights laws as fail-safe measures to ensure the protection of our property rights. The banks by-passed some of those redundant regulations resulting bank perpetrated foreclosure fraud and perjury, bank perpetrated mortgage fraud and perjury, and bank robo-signer scams (more bank perpetrated fraud and perjury).

Banks aren't the only guilty parties but they are among the biggest of the crooks.

Other redundant regulations that are involved with safety measures are also a good idea. Eliminating some redundant regulations may actually increase hazards and safety concerns.

Yes, common sense would prevent a lot of accidents but humans have proven too many times not to have common sense. As a former employer told me once, "You gotta make it idiot proof."

Eliminating the redundant regulations that require gas vapor valves on fuel pumps may work with modern cars but not everyone is driving a car made within the last five years, let alone the last fifty years. (Four-on-the-floor, suicide-doors, classic, hot-rod, muscle-cars come to mind.)

I originally come from fly-over country. There, twenty and thirty year old vehicles are not uncommon. (My dad just recently upgraded from a beat-up, 1984, straight-6, 4x4, F-150 with 2-50 air-conditioning - 2 windows rolled down while going 50mph - to a 1992, F350 diesel, 4x4, dually, flat-bed with real air-conditioning.)

Not all farm equipment is diesel powered; cars and trucks are not the only vehicles used. (Tricked-out, rider-lawn-mower races and dear ol' Dad frequents the local eateries by pulling into the parking lots on his gas powered, 1940's Farmall B tractor. They're a different breed out there in fly-over country.)

Not all fuel pumps are at convenience stores (500gal fuel tanks are not uncommon on farms) and not all things filled with gas have any equipment more sophisticated than a tank and a cap - and even a cap may be optional.

Here's a little secret. A lot of equipment "modifications" are made by the people who own or operate the equipment.

That vehicle, at one time, may have had a feature required by redundant regulations but that particular feature has long since been by-passed, cut out, torched off, smashed in, rerouted or re-purposed. Never underestimate the ingenuity of people with tools.

So even as redundant as it may seem to have a gas vapor valve on fuel pumps, those fuel pump valves are a safety precaution against un-safe (and all too frequent) "custom modifications". Sometimes redundant regulations are put in place to protect ourselves from ourselves. ("You gotta make it idiot proof.")

The Obama administration should eliminate regulation redundancies where it won't open up loop holes to be exploited and where no safety measures will be compromised. But don't be fooled into believing the BS that eliminating these redundant regulations will increase job growth by any significant amount. The structural problems of this country are too great and too unstable to create any real job growth anytime soon.



Comments
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Related Links:

Marketplace.org: White House says removing redundant regulations will grow jobs

http://marketplace.publicradio.org/display/web/2011/08/23/am-white-house-says-removing-redundant-regulations-will-grow-jobs/

TractorData.com - Farmall B

http://www.tractordata.com/farm-tractors/000/2/8/286-farmall-b.html