[sdarji]

The SBN, later ISBN, system was not created by 'Merica. The SBN system was created by a professor as a commissioned work for WH Smith, a UK-based bookseller. Later the ISO took over and standardized the ISBN.

ISBNs are not legally required by the government, any more than a book is required to have a title. They are a convenience for getting a book out there in retail channels and have it be identifiable, trackable, etc.

Any other person or group is free to invent a new system and get everyone in the book industry to adopt it alongside or as a replacement for ISBNs.

The U.S. government is not making you get an ISBN for your book. Many books are published without one. But neither did the U.S. government step up in 1970 and offer to be the issuer, unlike in many other countries like India and Canada. So the U.S. is in the minority of countries where a for-profit company ended up getting the right to be the issuer for that country. Considering that the vast majority of books in the U.S. are published by huge for-profit publishers, it doesn't seem that bad to have them pay the issuer $30 for a ISBN if they want the convenience. It's a free country, so they are free to eschew the ISBN as well.

I guess if you feel so strongly about it, you can lobby Congress to buy out R.R. Bowker, make the Librarian of Congress the registrar offering ISBNs for free, so they can add to the so-called Deep State!