Friday, July 23, 2010

Rules run amok

The cover story from the latest issue of the The Economist is a must read. Excerpt:
There are over 4,000 federal crimes, and many times that number of regulations that carry criminal penalties. When analysts at the Congressional Research Service tried to count the number of separate offences on the books, they were forced to give up, exhausted. Rules concerning corporate governance or the environment are often impossible to understand, yet breaking them can land you in prison.
Much of this stems from a mentality among legislators and bureaucrats that there is no problem which can't be fixed through passage of a new law. Combine this with draconian enforcement and the result is utter insanity.

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