Rein in the $1.75 Trillion Regulatory State

From Liberate to Stimulate: A Bipartisan Agenda to Restore Limited Government and Revive America's Economy

Liberate to Stimulate Index

Regulations are frequently anti-competitive and anti-consumer. They cost consumers hundreds of billions of dollars every year. Policy makers still largely do not know the full benefits and costs of their regulatory enterprise. Meanwhile, regulatory agencies grow in power and budget like feudal baronies. This situation must not go unchallenged.

From transportation to trade, from communications to banking and technology policy, policy makers of both parties have at times challenged the moral legitimacy, intellectual underpinnings, and economic rationality of federal regulatory intervention. Democrats helped spearhead transportation deregulation. Lawmakers from both parties rolled back unfunded mandates in the 1990s. The time is now ripe for a new round of reform. There are many avenues for reform.

Costbenefit analysis, while informative, does not actually bring the largely unaccountable regulatory state under congressional control. Greater congressional accountability and cost disclosure matter most for regulatory reform.