by Brian Doherty

About the author: Brian Doherty is an assistant editor for Reason, a monthly libertarian periodical.

The Americans with Disabilities Act’s (ADA) total costs are impossible to estimate with certainty. All we can know about are individual cases, and even there most people don’t want to talk. With a law that is usually triggered by activist complaints, says a restaurateur, “in a lot of cases someone is afraid that something they say is going to come back to them.”

The law rewards “good faith” compliance, so it behooves any business owner or manager not to say anything publicly that might betray a lack of good faith toward the ADA or its application. Lawyers, pundits, consultants, city officials, trade group reps, even people forced to pay tens...