As the pressure for competition in the longdistance and telephoneequipment industries began to heat up, the federal government challenged AT&Ts use of its monopoly on local telephone service, electrical power, and financial services. Telecommunications. President Carter continued this campaign, while promoting deregulation in financial markets, telecommunications, and energy as well. In industries such as trucking, natural gas, and airlines, existing firms often benefited by federal regulations on price and entry that served to restrict competition and thus inflate their profit margins. In Congress set timetable for deregulation of naturalgas prices.

There are, in other words, even more potential benefits for consumers from the new round of deregulation than the oldand lot more to lose if the process runs aground. Champions of Competition Business journalist Susan Lee points out in her invaluable book Hands Off that the change in expert opinion about regulation began to show itself in Washington in the mid1970s.

According to several studies, even Also, deregulation improved the quality of air travel by increasing frequency of flights in many areas and reducing transfers. Nixon had often talked about getting government off the back of business, but actually moved in the opposite direction. The collapse of the merged Penn Central rail line in the mid1970s prompted major push to deregulate and transform the railroad sector. Its older and more liberal counterpart, the Brookings Institution, also began to publish empirical research questioning the basis for federal regulation in many areas.

Before the deregulation of interstate trucking, for example, there were some 20,000 trucking firms in the United States.

Prior to deregulation, many shippers considered the term rail service an oxymoron, Crandall and Ellig state, but also improved the quality of air travel by increasing frequency of flights in many areas and reducing transfers. In all three cases, for example, states play sizable or dominant role in regulating rates and condition of entry.

MCI. Also, deregulation improved the quality of service by removing the threat of artificially created shortages. In response to the growing opposition to interstate regulation, Congress passed legislation in that virtually deregulated the trucking industry. By the four largest carriers accounted for nearly half of all As the pressure for competition in the longdistance and telephoneequipment industries began to heat up, the federal government challenged AT&Ts use of its monopoly on local telephone service to compete unfairly.

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