Reflections of an Unwitting 'Political Entrepreneur'

Abstract

By focusing on my role in airline deregulation, Philip Weiser's generous characterization of me as a political entrepreneur slights the large part of my career, expounding and then applying the economics of regulation to New York's public utilities. It fails also to convey the gradualness of my realization, at the CAB, that there was no acceptable half-way house between the thoroughgoing regulation I had inherited and genuine deregulation eighteen months later. Finally, it overlooks the contradiction most 18th century liberals would see between my efforts at the CAB and my conception of the strong antitrust policy that logically accompanies deregulation.