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Comment by good_gnu | Hacker News Reader

Sometimes getting input from lobbyists can actually be an all-around helpful thing to do. Think about things like industry norms such as the default sizes of shipping containers. Politicians who write such documents rarely have the technical knowledge to understand what the norms should and should not prescribe and the citizens do not care.

In such cases it is actually helpful for the lobbyists to decide, so long as different sizes of companies and different industries are represented.

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Please do not confuse “getting input from industry” with “getting input from lobbyists”. Getting unbiased, balanced input from a large section of industry is important, but if you think you (assuming you are a politician) can do that by simply listen to the lobbyists who show up at your door then you are not doing your job. Company lobbyists, however, know that this is what you will do, and they will tell you things which will give them advantages over their competitors, not what will benefit the industry as a whole.

It is a huge mistake to think that individual companies want things to be better for their field or industry as a whole. They don’t; whatever ups or downs the industry suffers will be borne equally by all, and is therefore irrelevant to the real goal of companies: to get an edge over the competition. Companies will gladly make things worse for everyone in their field if it means they will get a larger share of it. Politicians, apparently, do not know this, or do not have enough incentive to realize this, so politicians choose to listen to the lobbyists and choose to believe that they are thereby listening to the industry.

"Lobbyists" is just the label attached to the people who give input. Yes, they're professionals and yes, this is where the corruption happens, but that's just the nature of seeking input.

You surely don't expect companies to not advocate for themselves and be wholly altruistic? A lobbyist is paid to advocate for their client's interests. Sometimes that aligns with the public interest, most of the time it's a grey area.

There are plenty of opportunities for corruption in the interaction and those need to be addressed; rebranding 'lobbyists' isn't one of them.

I would disagree, I think it's a label attached to those people that actively attempt to influence policy making on behalf of their client's interests.

Just offering specialized input would be consulting.

And the way I see it: company and industry group lobbying works just fine, but there is a significant lack of public interest lobbying.

Nope. Definition of a lobbyist: "A lobbyist is someone hired by a business or a cause to persuade legislators to support that business or cause. Lobbyists get paid to win favor from politicians. For example, oil companies send lobbyists to Washington to try to make life easier for oil companies."

A lobbyist is a lobbyist. It's not the label assigned to people who give input in general.

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