I think you could have restrictions that make it extremely risky for friends and families to trade as proxies. You could have statutes that codify a judicial presumption for the proposition that a friend or family member of a congressperson making a trade anywhere near close in time or that could be plausibly related to the elected official's access to information is guilty, almost a strict liability standard for this kind of thing.

The degree to which this touches extended circles of friends and families does start to implicate reasonable tradeoffs between who would decide to run for office in the first place.

But I think we're just construing the moral standard for elected officials totally wrong. Nobody is making you run for office. You don't need to be doing this, and you are literally in charge of some of the most awesome power, authority, and responsibility human beings on this planet have ever known.

For God's sake, members of the clergy have to wear a uniform and abstain from sex and having families. I'm not saying we should have our elected officials become a priesthood, but I think we can look to other models of human organization and the way groups keep leaders entrusted with awesome responsibility in check to figure out ways to preserve the public trust that elected officials wield.

>I think you could have restrictions that make it extremely risky for friends and families to trade as proxies.

I'm not sure that doesn't just get you the status quo but worse.

So if a politician has a moral compass and gives the machine the bird the machine investigates their families and we all know the laws are gonna be written so that if they wanna find something they will. Of course those who are protected by the machine will still do their thing unfettered.