Reading the latest round of Jones Act threads has me thinking about what the right balance of industry specific vs general economic/political/logistic knowledge and experience is best for improving the situation and debating ideas on how to do it. I think background is also a factor in what people even identify as a problem.
It’s very easy to say “This is how we do it, this is how we’ve always done it, things are good in my world so let’s keep doing it.”
It’s equally easy to say “in Chapter 3 Mankiw says that, so this is wrong.”
The maritime industry generally and the US industry do some things differently than others, just like every other industry and country. I think it will be very important to be able to clearly identify and communicate the reasons for those differences. What’s a (maritime) regulatory requirement, what is a result of geography, what is a second or third order result of a non-maritime regulation?
It will also be important for people proposing changes to clearly state the perceived problem they are proposing a solution for, and to have enough knowledge to not make poor mistakes in language that cause people to drop out of an otherwise worthwhile discussion ( for me “MSP/ACP” is a showstopper! Tell me you read some white papers without telling me you read some white papers.)
Carry On!