The Disinterest in Deregulation - Comment

In a recent article in this Review, Robert McCormick, William Shughart, and Robert Tollison (1984) addressed the issue of monopoly deregulation. The authors put forward the provocative idea that "because under most conditions Tullock costs cannot be recouped, the returns to deregulation are lower than previously thought." We point out that McCormick et al. have not actually shown, as they claim, that "such a deregulating program can easily impose more costs than it is worth" (p. 1075)