The public choice model of rent-seeking economics is used to analyze the behaviour of firms, interest groups and scientists participating in efforts to impose climate change cap-and-trade regulations of greenhouse gasses in the USA. This may serve as a case study for the entire world. Yandle's “Bootleggers and Baptists” model and McChesney's model “money for nothing” are used to explain the formation, motives and interests of the groups lobbying for or against this type of regulation. The eco-industrial complex includes firms seeking favorable treatment under cap-and-trade regime, scientists relying on the global warming panic to keep research funds flowing and environmentalist NGOs interested in setting the public agenda and attracting grants and donations. According to our analysis nuclear and renewable energy firms are acting as bootleggers (who profit from legally restricted energy market), while the oil firms are behaving as agents paying protection money) to politicians and NGOs for not demanding harmful public regulation (legal extortion, i.e. “money for nothing”).
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