Regulation, the carrot, or the stick?
When it comes to regulation there are generally two paths we can take; We can use a carrot to attempt to reward or encourage the adoption of the regulation Or as our federal government tends to use the stick passing new regulation then allowing the assessment of fines for failure to comply. When it comes to these two approaches to regulation, I believe our best approach is a combination of the carrot and the stick. if we intend on passing new regulations for example on farmers requiring them to upgrade their standards for containment of animals; This in itself is not a horrible regulation, however when you lack the financial means to implement a large-scale upgrade such as this; then allow the federal government to tack on fines for not being able to comply it further reduces your ability to comply with said regulation.
this simply adds insult to injury.
This is one reason I set out to develop the farm modernization Act, it was my attempt to help Farmers with a fund of money: not for repairs, not for losses, but for upgrading their facilities to comply with regulations. so that they're not fined by the government and find themselves short when they're attempting to comply with new regulation in the first place. I'd like to attempt to expand this sort of approach to all businesses to allow us to say, stop dumping your waist sewage into the river or whatever the requirement at the time is. I’d rather be saying here's some money to help you solve your problem; Tell us what you're going to do. If it then continues that is when you want to assess fines, fees and beat the crap out of them with the federal governments heavy hammer.
This kind of approach is almost guaranteed to see a better results in compliance rather than our current approach of just assessing fines, fees and trying to generally make money off of people. Not being able to comply with new standards that could be passed at any time. I find people are generally not against regulations, they're generally against how their implemented, the system that we employ to attempt to force their compliance. I believe by offering a carrot before the stick will allow us to do everything from implement better regulations regarding the environment, food safety, work safety, name the regulation and you will probably find greater compliance by using this approach.
For example, to bring it down to a personal level or on a local level. if your city were to walk up to you and say we want you to get rid of all this junk around your house or we'll fine you, likely you'd become defensive and want to put up a fight. The same can be true about organizations like small farms and cooperatives and business. But if the city were walk up saying, We’d like you to clean up all this junk, is there anything we can do to help you accomplish this. That changes the whole tone on the subject, making individual people be less defensive and more cooperative. In efforts to better the world.
