OpenMarket

Despite hesitation from the Federal Reserve, the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC) has made clear that they plan to push forward with their revamp of the Community Reinvestment Act (CRA). The plan which was jointly proposed with the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC) late last year, if implemented...

Today, CEI was joined by 10 other organizations in a letter to members of the House of Representatives supporting the Revamping American Infrastructure Act of 2020, which aims to “facilitate the use of outcome-based performance standards by the Department of Transportation.

Antitrust policy interventions into the market rarely work as intended.

The temperatures we are experiencing are consistent with a modest warming, and we may be in the zone where modest warming is a net benefit.

In a busy week, President Trump signed Phase One of a trade agreement with China on Wednesday. On Thursday, the Senate ratified the USMCA trade agreement and began President Trump’s impeachment trial on the same day. New final regulations for the week range from wheeled stretchers to electronic detonators.

Is there good reason to believe climate change a “crisis” endangering the survival of civilization and the habitability of the Earth? No. If climate change were a bona fide “existential threat,” we would see some evidence of it in major metrics of human well-being. We don’t.

A new CDC report puts the final nail in the coffin of the idea that the spat of lung injuries that occurred beginning last summer were caused by “vaping.” The CDC admitted this week that the injuries appear to be exclusively linked to marijuana vapes—not nicotine e-cigarettes, most of which were purchased on the black market, a fact that CEI knew nearly six months ago. 

The USMCA trade agreement passed the Senate today. USMCA is valuable damage control. Three years of unpredictable tariff increases, threats of increases, and diplomatic tensions will hopefully have more stability going forward. Unfortunately, USMCA is filled with trade-unrelated provisions and giveaways to business, labor, and environmental interests. Trade agreements should stick to trade issues.

Phase One of a trade deal with China has enormous value as damage control against further tariffs, but it comes at a cost. The Trump administration has more than doubled total U.S. tariffs in its first three years, and other countries, including China, have responded in kind. Phase One’s signing hopefully marks an end to a tariff-first trade policy and its unpredictable implementation. But a ceasefire is not a victory. Massive tariffs put in place less than two years ago will remain in place, and risk becoming normalized.

Under the practice known as union release time, public employees are allowed to conduct union business during work hours at taxpayer expense.