U.S. Pickle Permit Police Will be the Death of Us.

Hey, you can't sell that pickle without a permit!!

Petty, turf-conscious, by-the-book bureaucrats are shutting down "illegal" grocery providers in Los Angeles, according to this report in Reason.

"A few Los Angeles restaurants struggling to maintain footing amid the COVID-19 outbreak identified a clever way to generate revenue while still serving the community: Start selling groceries.

The city's public health department promptly shut them down. The reason? The small businesses don't have a "grocery permit."

"It's not really possible for a restaurant to become a grocery store," Dr. Barbara Ferrer, director of Los Angeles County Public Health, said in a briefing yesterday. "You cannot just decide you want to sell groceries."

So, what's one big lesson to be learned from this?

Meddlesome government does more harm than good. 

We've become a culture of nay-saying rather than yay-saying by handing unelected apparatchiks overly vast powers that they wield with the rigidity and ruthlessness of a Soviet kommisar. Most of what the government does today is to restrain productivity, creativity, adaptability and innovation, often for anachronistic or invalid reasons. In a crisis, when we need to move quickly, we see that hitting the "stop" button on the government's robotic red tape dispenser is the quickest way to get results. Mountains can still be moved . . . but only when the mountain of accreted rules and regulations at the local, state and federal levels are bulldozed aside and free enterprise has a chance to breath again.   

If America survives this, it will be the private sector, unshackled from government red tape, that saves our bacon. And we can come out of this situation stronger than ever before if we refuse to go back to the somnambulant "normal" and declare a continuous war on unnecessary red tape once the immediate crisis recedes.  

The COVID Recovery Will Require a Continuous War on Red Tape

Here's some welcome news. I love to see the productive sector (i.e. private sector) swinging into action in response to the coronavirus crisis. But why is federal permission needed before private companies can start cranking-out respirators or any other pieces of medical equipment? And how does that square with our boasts about being a "free country"? 

It's encouraging to see President Trump clearing-away the massive knot of red tape (much of it outdated, unnecessary or just plain asinine) that normally anchors down the US economy. But why does most of this red tape exist? What purpose (aside from empowering bureaucrats and keeping lawyers and the compliance officers busy) does it serve? And do we still need it? Aren't these questions we ought to be asking not just when the shit hits the fan, but when normalcy prevails?

Just imagine what we could accomplish -- just imagine how much more dynamic and responsive the US economy would be -- if we could make these emergency measures permanent once the crisis passes. Trump has had unheralded success in his first term slicing and dicing red tape. It's a story that doesn't get told because the press and pundits would prefer to focus on the tweets and the gaffes and the "unpresidential" antics. And the economy was strongly responding until the outbreak occurred. 

We'll need much more regulatory relief in order to speed the post-COVID recovery. We'll need to continue emergency rules reductions after the human health crisis wanes and we turn our attention to saving and restoring our economic health.

No one other than Trump has the steel stones necessary to throw out the old rule book and rein-in the regulatory superstate. This is where his brashness, bravado and take-no-prisoners attitude become assets, not liabilities. Can anyone imagine a regulation-worshipping liberal like Bernie or Biden doing that? I can't.

Regulatory Malpractice

Stories like this one, which indicates that California's "landmark" diesel control law was based on a 340 percent overestimate of pollution levels by the state's Air Resources Board, makes one wonder what other costly regulations are premised on false -- or even falsified -- government data.

The government is conveniently immune from the sorts of malpractice claims that can be brought against private individuals and entities, meaning it can walk away from such costly debacles embarrassed (perhaps) but unscathed. And that's an injustice that needs addressing. It's time to change the rules so that injured parties and average citizens can hold the government liable in such cases of regulatory malpractice. That might help make the reflex-regulators a lot more careful about getting the science right before they begin recklessly imposing new rules.

The George Orwell Film Festival

The EPA recently announced a contest -- the "Rulemaking Matters Video Contest" -- asking Americans to submit videos extolling the virtues of the regulatory superstate. It's a fun, creative way to show how grateful we all are for the blessings bestowed on us by Big Government.

Here's the actual press release, in case you think I'm joking. And because it's the EPA, don't forget to carefully follow all the rules. Naturally, there will be a form or two to fill out. The EPA prefers that you use the term "rulemaking," instead of "regulating" -- the latter carries such negative connotations with some folks. Finally, please be sure that no plants or animals are harmed, or noxious chemicals released into the environment, during the making of your video: You don't want to end up on the bad side of the EPA. The winner will walk away with $2,500 in prize money (before taxes, of course, since all this "protection" doesn't come cheap).

My fun-loving former colleagues at the Competitive Enterprise Institute have entered the contest, with a somewhat tongue-in-cheek short called "A Day in the Life of the The Regulatory State." Find it on YouTube by following this link. Somehow, I don't think it will win top prize. But I found it entertaining.

Congress takes aim at another scapegoat

High gas pump prices have members of Congress searching for scapegoats again – an imperative, lest Americans begin looking too closely at Congress’ own (very considerable) role in establishing a regulatory climate that creates false scarcity and drives prices higher. Big Oil “profiteers” are always convenient bogeyman, but the witch hunt now seems to be shifting to the role that “speculators” may be playing, as this story in the Los Angeles Times.

I honestly don’t know enough about commodities to speculate about what role, if any, traders are playing in high gas prices (though I would wager money that an unbiased analysis would find Congress far more culpable than commodities traders), but the Reuters wire service has done enough solid journalism to dig out the facts: Reuters News Wire.

It doesn’t seem to me, as a layperson, that this sector of the market is completely unregulated, or that a regulatory overreaction by Washington is warranted, given the high probability that government intervention will cause more problems than it solves.