Loyola University Chicago Law Journal Volume 33 Article 11 Issue 4 Summer 2002 2002 Twenty-Five Years of Deregulation: Lessons for Electric Power John E. Kwoka Jr. Northeastern University Follow this and additional works at: http://lawecommons.luc.edu/luclj Part of the Energy and Utilities Law Commons Recommended Citation John E. KwokaJr., Twenty-Five Years of Deregulation: Lessons for Electric Power, 33 Loy. U. Chi. L. J. 885 (2002). Available at: http://lawecommons.luc.edu/luclj/vol33/iss4/11 This Article is brought to you for free and open access by LAW eCommons. It has been accepted for inclusion in Loyola University Chicago Law Journal by an authorized administrator of LAW eCommons. For more information, please contact
[email protected]. Twenty-Five Years of Deregulation: Lessons for Electric Power John E. Kwoka, Jr.* I. INTRODUCTION Twenty-five years ago, fully 17% of U.S. economic output derived from heavily regulated industries.' At present no more than one-third of that remains. 2 In the interim, a deregulation movement of the scope and intensity that may even have surprised its advocates has swept through the airline, brokerage services, telecommunications, trucking, railroads, cable TV, banking, petroleum, and natural gas industries. Not all of these industries have been completely deregulated. Some aspects of telecom and railroads, for example, make that imprudent or simply infeasible. Moreover, not all of these deregulatory experiences were complete successes. Cable TV and banking are generally viewed as problematic cases, but deregulation of virtually all industries has drawn at least some criticism. Nonetheless, this movement-documented in the list of deregulatory initiatives in Table 13-has resulted in a sweeping transformation of industry in the U.S.