> Then you read about how San Francisco requires 14 permits that take 9 months to issue (plus a separate alcohol permit) and you wonder why anyone opens a restaurant at all (compounded by the fact that already-permitted restaurants have a vested interest in making the process more onerous over time). Multiply that burden by all of the restaurants that never get created and the cost is very large indeed.

so...either San Francisco has no restaurants at all, or this argument is complete garbage.

> This argument certainly applies to net neutrality in a far more profound way: the Internet has been the single most important driver of not just economic growth but overall consumer welfare for the last two decades.

Two decades where Comcast did not own Universal did not own NBC, Time Warner Cable did not own Warner, HBO, Turner, CNN, AT&T did not own them, and people watched TV on about 50 cable channels and not at all on the internet, rented DVDs/VHS from the video store and not at all on the internet. Cord cutting as a viable thing for not just movies but also TV has only begun in the last couple of years. [edit]: the conflicts of interest in modern ISPs, being that they now produce and own huge slices of the content itself that they serve, in fierce competition with just a few other giants, are orders of magnitude greater than they were even five years ago.

> Given that all of that dynamism has been achieved with minimal regulatory oversight, the default position of anyone concerned about future growth should be maintaining a light touch.

A hand-wavy "regulations! killing business!" argument. Regulations have a purpose and you will notice it every time you notice buildings having working fire exits and your dairy product at the supermarket not killing you.

> I’ll say it again — who can be against net neutrality?

Comcast, who has tried to block certain services already.