According to the Foundry:

Two competing solar power companies, Ausra and BrightSource Energy, recently filed plans to build plants in the California desert. Both firms’ plans affected wildlife habitat. But only Ausra’s plans were hit with complaints demanding expensive and cumbersome environmental studies. The reason? Ausra had rejected demands that it use only union workers to build its solar farm, while BrightSource pledged to hire labor-friendly contractors.

As the New York Times reports today, big labor is using California’s environmental regulations to shake down power companies trying to build new plants in the state: “If they refuse, they say, they can count on the union group to demand costly environmental studies and deliver hostile testimony at public hearings. If they commit at the outset to use union labor, they say, the environmental objections never materialize.” As harmful as this racket is to California’s economy, new regulations proposed by the Obama administration will empower other special interest groups to shake down businesses nationwide.

Regulation is more or less seen as innocuous. The problem is that regulation often times opens door for corruption and political maneuvering. This example shows how environmental regulation is being used politically by unions to procure jobs for their people. Regulation must assuredly has its dangers, the most obvious being that it consolidates state power into less hands.

I would also like to note that it’s not enough to support regulation and then downplay the corruption it creates by arguing for more regulation which aims to eliminate the corruption caused by the original regulation. In other words, it should be assumed that all regulation will create corruption, and that their is no way this can be completely eliminated, therefore, the benefits of the regulation must clearly outweigh the inevitable corruption it creates.

I have in mind the fact that many on the left support financial and environmental regulation and then complain when such regulation makes politicians vulnerable to lobbyists and campaign donors. Identifying that the expanded power is being abused, those on the left argue for more regulation in the form of campaign finance reform. They fail to realize that the crux of the problem is their suppot of polices that create questionable incentives for politicians.

We wouldn’t need campaign finance reform if politicians didn’t have the power that lobbyists and corporations want to influence.

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