OIRA@2050

Editor’s Note:  Any Analysis which considers the potential for regulations to create jobs need to distinguish between productive and unproductive work.  An economy cannot be sustained by diverting scarce resources to “paper-pushing” and other unproductive, federally-mandated labor.

From: NYT

By JOHN M. BRODER

It is a rare day that you pick up a newspaper without encountering a reference to “job-killing regulations” from a pro-business Republican complaining about the burden of a new rule from the Environmental Protection Agency or other government office. Sometimes large and scary job loss numbers are attached to the assertion and attributed to a study, most often financed by the affected industry.

From: American Thinker

Richard Terrell’s cartoon (more a picture of reality) on March 25, 2012 about the maze of regulations thrown up by the Departments of Interior (DOI) and Energy (DOE), as well as by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), really describes the country in which we currently live.

Congress passes the laws that govern the U.S., but Congress has also authorized the EPA and other federal agencies to help put the laws into effect by creating and enforcing regulations. The list of the Code of Federal Regulations (CFR) is quite long, encompassing every subject from infants to the aged, from drug abuse to health care. In this list are DOI, DOE, and EPA regulations.

Editor’s Note:  The following article discussing the possibility of political influence on cost-benefit analysis highlights the need for greater rigor and transparency in cost-benefit analyses.  The authors’ goal of “making the process for generating and reviewing analyses as transparent as possible while insulating BCA from politics as much as is legally feasible” could be advanced by subjecting such analyses to the Data Quality Act’s Request for Correction process.

From: RegBlog

Appreciating the Politics Inside Benefit-Cost Analysis

Stuart Shapiro and John Morrall

From: US News & World Report

By Jerry Ellig

While the Supreme Court weighs the constitutionality of the Affordable Care Act, Congress is holding hearings on the federal regulatory process. The two topics are more closely related than you might think. The healthcare law required many regulations, and thus far, the major regulations issued to implement the Affordable Care Act serve as ugly poster children for the regulatory reform movement.

Regulations like those implementing the healthcare law have major effects on Americans’ healthcare choices and cost hundreds of millions of dollars. But when agencies don’t even take the time to understand the problem, consumers may have to sacrifice personal freedom and precious dollars for an ineffective solution.

From: Bomble Magazine

Regulation Creates Jobs?

by Jim Swift

Dubious claims about regulation-created prosperity from OIRA Administrator Cass Sunstein aside, the focus on regulation and its impact on the economy is often either misunderstood or rarely given an in depth look.

However, there is no doubt that regulation creates jobs. Sorry fellow conservatives, we have to be honest and admit that regulation does creates jobs. It creates them in Congress, it creates them in the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs, it creates them in lobbying firms, at the Government Printing Office, and among truckers, and paper makers.

From: Western Farm Press

Cass Sunstein, administrator of the White House Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs (OIRA), issued guidance encouraging agencies, including EPA, to carefully assess the cumulative economic costs and other impacts of their rules on small businesses and start-ups “where appropriate and feasible.” This guidance  is effective immediately.

The guidance could help ease criticisms from Republicans, industry and agriculture that EPA is failing to consider the cumulative adverse economic impacts of its various regulations. Congressional Republicans have introduced several bills to require cumulative economic impacts.

Editor’s Note:  The paper is attached below in pdf.

From: Heritage Foundation

By James Gattuso and Diane Katz

Abstract: During the first three years of the Obama Administration, 106 new major federal regulations added more than $46 billion per year in new costs for Americans. This is almost four times the number—and more than five times the cost—of the major regulations issued by George W. Bush during his first three years. Hundreds more regulations are winding through the rulemaking pipeline as a consequence of the Dodd–Frank financial-regulation law, the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, and the Environmental Protection Agency’s global warming crusade, threatening to further weaken an anemic economy and job creation. Congress must increase scrutiny of regulations—existing and new. Reforms should include requiring congressional approval of major rules and mandatory sunset clauses for major regulations.

Editor’s Note:  There are some striking statements in this presentation regarding  then prominent members of the judicary.  We encourage all readers  to  post their views in the comment section below.

Geoff Shepard, who participated in the White House Watergate defense, describes serious flaws in the conduct of the Watergate trials that he claims denied the defendants their Constitutional right to due process of law.  The presentation is based on a book that he is writing about the same topic.

http://www.youtube.com/user/NixonFoundation?feature=mhee#p/u/3/1UmBiNCmlLs

From: RegBlog

by José Carlos Laguna de Paz

With more than a dozen related bills in Congress, cybersecurity has become a pressing policy topic. Several of these bills would give federal regulators the power to mandate how private sector networks are secured. But do private networks really need to be told how to protect themselves? If there’s no market failure for the government to correct, then shouldn’t private networks be left to secure themselves? Having direct knowledge of their systems, they are surely better equipped than outsiders—and should have the greatest incentives—to do so. In this short briefing paper, we explain what a mar- ket failure is and how the concept applies to cybersecurity.

Editor’s Note:  The NGO letter is attached at the bottom of the post.

From: Inside EPA

Environmentalists are urging EPA to reject an industry-filed Data Quality Act (DQA) petition challenging the agency’s method for estimating greenhouse gases (GHG), including methane from natural gas drilling — underpinning pending EPA rules for the sector — by warning that EPA could violate the data quality guidelines if it changes the estimates.