The Unsustainable Costs of Partial Deregulation

Three decades ago, federal policymakers—Republicans and Democrats—embarked on a general strategy of deregulation. In the electricity, gas delivery, and telecommunications industries, the strategy called for restructuring to separate production from transmission and distribution, followed by elimination of price controls. The expected results were lower prices and increased quality, reliability, and scope of services. Paul W. MacAvoy, an economist with forty years of experience in the regula...