RALEIGH – Is there anything so outrageous, and so perfect an example of regulatory overreach, as the 2007 federal legislation that tells Americans which light bulbs they are allowed to purchase for home use?
U.S. Rep. Howard Coble doesn’t think so. The Greensboro Republican is a sponsor of a bill to repeal the federal law, which set up a timetable to phase out the sale of inexpensive incandescent light bulbs beginning in 2012. After that date, consumers will only be allowed to purchase more-expensive incandescent bulbs or those horrible compact fluorescent bulbs.
The busybodies who fashioned the 2007 legislation argued that consumers will save money in the long run because the most-expensive bulbs will reduce energy bills. If true, why did they need to dictate it? Americans can figure these things out for ourselves. We don’t need the federal government to do our math for us.
As it happens, there is plenty of room for debate about the purported energy conservation and cost savings. Some of the CFL don’t last as long as their manufacturers claim. They are also costly to dispose of properly, and there is some evidence that consumers react to the lower energy consumption by leaving the lights on longer – in part because it takes longer for CFLs to come back on.
Still, the fundamental point is this: Mind your own business! If I want to pay higher energy bills to keep the lighting fixtures I prefer, that’s my affair.
I know I’m not the only consumer planning to subvert the intent of the law as long as possible by purchasing a large quantity of light bulbs later this year and storing them in my attic. But a better solution would be for the new Congress to pass Rep. Coble’s repeal legislation.
“It seems to me the Congress and the government is inserting its oars in waters where it doesn’t need to go,” Coble told the Greensboro News & Record. Exactly. I also like the allusion to oarsmen – it reminds one of the galley scenes from Ben-Hur, which convey the appropriate feeling of tyrannical servitude. It’s also worth remembering that the legislation was heavily lobbied for by CFL manufacturers. They succeeded in getting the federal government to force consumers to buy their products. Talk about special-interest legislation.
The repeal bill might well have the votes to get through House committees and onto the floor. Perhaps it will even pass the House. But allusions to personal freedom are unlikely to move the Senate or White House to go along with repeal. They are led by politicians with little evident concern for personal freedom, a concept they view as archaic and inconvenient to their goal of centralizing more power in government, and particularly in Washington.
Perhaps the only argument that might sway them is this one: within the next couple of years, if the light-bulb bill isn’t repealed, it is going to prove to be extremely unpopular. Many Americans don’t yet realize that they will have to pay many dollars more per unit to replace their worn-out bulbs. When they start going to the store and finding only ugly, overpriced bulbs on the shelves, they are going to be furious.
If the Left wants to respond to the resulting public fury with some version of “shut up – we’re only doing this for your own good, you dumb peons,” that’ll be fine with me. Let’s see how the response works out for them. I think it could be both educational and entertaining.
Hood is president of the John Locke Foundation.