The Revolving Door
The legal pipeline between regulating an industry and being employed by it. (see also Military Industrial Complex)
How We Say It
thuh ri·vol·ving dor
Where It Comes From
The revolving door as a metaphor for the exchange of personnel between government and private industry dates to at least the 1950s in American political writing. The physical revolving door was patented in 1888 by Theophilus Van Kannel — who would presumably be appalled at what his invention came to represent.
How It's Been Used
Documented, legal, and continuous across administrations of both parties. Senior officials at regulatory agencies routinely move to the industries they regulated; industry executives move into the agencies that oversee them. The result is regulatory capture — agencies that protect the industries they are supposed to police. The term is used critically but the practice continues because it is not illegal.