When the airline industry has a disaster, it goes under review by the National Transportation Safety Board. When corporations dump a toxic brew of chemicals into ground surface waters, they are supposed to answer to the EPA. When drug companies' products – drugs and vaccines – cause more health problems than they prevent or cure, they are supposed to be subject to recall by the FDA.

When regulatory agencies become dominated by the corporations they are supposed to control, that agency has been captured by the industry. The public interest becomes a lower priority than the bidding of the will of the industry, and the industry flourishes – most of the time at the cost of human health.

Examples exist from agencies tasked with regulating finances, the airline industry, the chemical industry, the petroleum industry, the defense industry, and, of course, the pharmaceutical industry. Those who understand the specific details of regulatory capture eventually develop the position that a captured agency is worse than no agency at all, because via their influence, corporations can begin to wield the administrative power of the executive branch of government, which is more efficient and less expensive than buying political influence.