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Regulatory capture is when regulators later join the people they were regulating This compromises their ability to regulate because they anticipate working that industry later. David Stein used to regulate the financial industry. Now he works in it. That's exactly what regulatory capture is.



I'd say that that's a mechanism of regulatory capture, but not the phenomenon, itself. As Wikipedia puts it:

"Regulatory capture is a form of government failure that occurs when a regulatory agency, created to act in the public interest, instead advances the commercial or political concerns of special interest groups that dominate the industry or sector it is charged with regulating."

There are many ways this happens without a revolving door.


Yep look at hairdressing, taxi, funeral homes industries for examples.


And banking, for another example.


IE, the EPA at the moment.


What you've described is the revolving door, which is logically disjoint from regulatory capture.




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