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N.C. Official Sics License Police On Computer Scientist For Too Good a Complaint
snsh writes "When a computer scientist in North Carolina petitioned the state for a new traffic signal in his neighborhood, a transportation official replied with a complaint about what 'appears to be engineering-level work' done by someone who is not licensed as a professional engineer." Kevin Lacy, chief traffic engineer for the state DOT, and the one who filed a complaint with the N.C. Board of Examiners for Engineers and Surveyors, protested that in trying to have Computer Scientist David Cox investigated for his detailed complaint about a traffic intersection while not licensed as a professional engineer, "I'm not trying to hush him up."
Perhaps you are not against "all regulation." But a lot of libertarians are.
A wholly irrelevant observation. I'm sure, with modest effort, I could find some nutcases that partially agree with beliefs of yours. Should that in any way change my view of your writing above? Of course not.
What we have here, though, is not an example of regulation. It is an example of someone deciding that being a government employee gives him the right, nay, the responsibility to act like a petty tyrant. It's got nothing to do with regulation, per se. It's abuse of power. It's very common in the U.S., and practiced by government functionaries from all parts of the political spectrum.
It's universal in human societies of any size, not just the US. What you miss here is the synergy of a heavy regulatory burden with petty tyrants. This guy dug up the worst regulation he could find. That it is so embarrassingly paltry and contrived a complaint is due to a relatively low regulatory environment. In part, the weakness of the petty tyrant in this story is due to the absence of regulatory levers with which to oppress this group of citizens.
Police states operate on the principle that everyone is guilty of breaking some law or regulation, but enforcement of the law is at the whim and convenience of the government.
It's unfortunate that we the people tend to spend so much time being polarized against one another, and less time acting as citizens should: restraining abuses of power in the government that is supposed to be working for us.
There are natural conflicts of interest between people. The basic conflict is simply that I can gain by taking your stuff. This means that no matter how grievous the abuse of power, it is likely that someone will support it merely because they benefit (and care not a whit for a free society).
Even when people sincerely want an open government which respects their freedoms, a large, complex government can hide many things. Abuse can go unrecognized for a long time as a result. Complexity can also make compliance with regulation difficult and costly.
Hence, I see three reasons to minimize government regulation:
1) It reduces the opportunity for harassing citizens and businesses which are at odds with a government.
2) It reduces the incentives to game the regulatory system to gain a competitive advantage (ie, rent-seeking through regulation).
3) It reduces the complexity of government and makes the resulting government more democratic and compliance with regulation cheaper and less onerous.