Why Everything Is Dirtier - Jeffrey A. Tucker - Mises Daily
Thanks to Mark Gidman for pointing out this enlightening article about laundry detergent and absurd government regulations that derail innovation and damage businesses.
From Everything is Dirtier by Jeffrey A. Tucker:
“The difference wasn’t obvious at first. But as time has gone on, other changes began to take place, like the mandates for machines that use less water (as Mark Thornton writes about), along with mandates for tepid temperatures of water in our homes. In the end, the result is dramatic. It all amounts to dirty, yellowing clothes.
This is the exact opposite of what we expect in markets, in which products are ever better and cheaper due to innovation, expansion of the division of labor, and competition. But with government regulation, the results are deliberately the opposite. We pay ever-higher prices for shoddy results.”
And how does it happen? Slowly.
“Do we see what is happening here? I can detect very little in the way of public knowledge, much less outcry. In the old Cold War days, I recall wondering how it was that the Soviet people could have put up with state-caused impoverishment for decade after decade, and wondering why people didn’t just rise up and overthrow their impoverishers. Now I’m beginning to see why. If this all happens slowly and quietly, there is no point at which the reality of cause and effect dawns on people.”
Go read the whole article. Then go buy some trisodium phosphate (TSP) (note the review on it).
