# Regulatory reviews can outlast building a rocket Markdown copy of https://realalpha.app/s/regulatory-reviews-can-outlast-building-a-rocket/ on Real Alpha, the best minutes from long interviews with the people building AI. Cite and link the page, not this copy. - Speaker: [Elon Musk](https://realalpha.app/builders/elon-musk/) · Elon Musk is a business magnate, designer, and engineer. · Co-founded PayPal, founded SpaceX and xAI, and has been Tesla's CEO since 2008. - Host: [Joe Rogan](https://realalpha.app/people/joe-rogan/) · Host, The Joe Rogan Experience - Show: The Joe Rogan Experience - Episode: [Joe Rogan Experience #2223 - Elon Musk](https://realalpha.app/v/7qZl_5xHoBw/), Nov 4, 2024 - Moment: 2:10:33 to 2:14:45 of the episode (4 min), playing on https://realalpha.app/s/regulatory-reviews-can-outlast-building-a-rocket/; the episode from there: https://realalpha.app/v/7qZl_5xHoBw/?t=7833 ## Quote > “We could **build the rocket faster** than they could process the paperwork to approve the launch.” > — [Elon Musk](https://realalpha.app/builders/elon-musk/) at [2:11:43](https://realalpha.app/v/7qZl_5xHoBw/?t=7903) · The Joe Rogan Experience ## Takeaways 1. Starship waited two months for launch approval, he says. 2. More agencies create extra coordination and paperwork. 3. Musk argues agencies should stay within congressional mandates. ## About this segment Elon Musk says agencies expand beyond their mandates and describes Starship waiting two months for launch approval. He argues overlapping reviews slow projects and infrastructure. From “Joe Rogan Experience #2223 - Elon Musk”, Nov 4, 2024. [Watch the full episode](https://realalpha.app/v/7qZl_5xHoBw/) ## Transcript Transcribed by machine (Whisper) from the episode’s audio, so a word may be off here and there. [2:10:37](https://realalpha.app/v/7qZl_5xHoBw/?t=7837) obviously the president has a lot of power but how much power and what can be done in terms of like eliminating agencies, eliminating waste, eliminating... Yeah, well, I mean, so, like, if Congress has created an agency, then, I mean, often if you look at the law, the law is, like, pretty simple, like, the agency has, like, a very simple task, but then that agency, over time, vastly increases its authority and starts doing things that... [2:11:05](https://realalpha.app/v/7qZl_5xHoBw/?t=7865) We're never authorized by Congress. That's happened with pretty much every agency. So, yeah, you'd have to still keep an agency. You'd have to match the law, but you can curtail the agencies to be much smaller and say, you've got to stick to what Congress authorized instead of all this other stuff you're doing, which I think makes sense. And so is the other stuff they're doing just essentially bureaucracy run amok, where they just create jobs and create things to do and create a meaning for their existence? [2:11:36](https://realalpha.app/v/7qZl_5xHoBw/?t=7896) Yeah. It's like a tumor. It's just going to keep growing. Jesus Christ. And it's so, I mean, for SpaceX, Starship was sitting on the pad. The rocket, the giant rocket. We could build the rocket faster than they could process the paperwork to approve the launch. So we're sitting there for two months. But do you think that they're doing that on purpose to fuck with you? I mean, maybe a little, but, I mean, that would also not be cool. [2:12:05](https://realalpha.app/v/7qZl_5xHoBw/?t=7925) Yeah. But another way to think of it is, like, the amount of paperwork is going to go roughly with the square of the number of agencies involved. Because they all have to meet with each other. So, like, let's say in a best-case situation, if you've got, like, if there's, like, if you're dealing with one agency, that's one thing. But if you've got to deal with five agencies, and the agencies will have to meet with each other, now you've got like 25 different meeting configurations that have to take place. [2:12:45](https://realalpha.app/v/7qZl_5xHoBw/?t=7965) Everything just – you get just hardening of the arteries. You just can't make progress. Like this is why we can't build high-speed rail in America. It's basically illegal. Right. Right. So the argument has always been that we need regulation because we need to protect the environment. We need to protect people. We need to make sure the rule of law is followed. So we need a certain amount of regulation. [2:13:06](https://realalpha.app/v/7qZl_5xHoBw/?t=7986) We do. But overregulation is a giant problem. That's a big issue in California. It's a huge issue anywhere where bureaucracy has run amok. They make it very difficult to get anything done. Yes. I mean, what happens is every year there are more rules and regulations created. and in the past what has served as a cleansing function for rules and regulations is war because like well we're going to lose if we don't kind of clear the decks but we haven't really had an existential threat of war in the u.s we've had prosperity for a long time which has resulted in a massive build-up of rules and regulations every year and to the point where like i said like everything's illegal you know and it's not like any one regulation is the problem it's like it's like gulliver being tied down by a million little strings it's not like any one string is [2:13:56](https://realalpha.app/v/7qZl_5xHoBw/?t=8036) the problem but you got a million of them so we have we've we've got to clear the decks here um and and i i'm not saying we shouldn't have regulators i'm just saying we we've gone way too far once you think of regulators like uh like referees on a field you know a sports field um you don't want to have no no refs you want to have some number of refs but you don't you don't have way more refs than players right you don't want to be like well you know the running back couldn't couldn't complete the past because there were too many regulators in the way because the football field's full of regulators yeah you know it's like you can't even play the game right that's the issue we've got right now well that's a great analogy yeah i can imagine a football field that's filled with this is like the football field's pulled with refs you know [2:14:41](https://realalpha.app/v/7qZl_5xHoBw/?t=8081) Yeah, you can't even run past them.