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Senate Ratifies Anti-Consumer Kigali Amendment–but with A Silver Lining Regarding China
Last Wednesday, the Senate ratified the Kigali Amendment, a United Nations treaty restricting supplies of hydrofluorocarbons (HFCs), a widely used class of refrigerants now targeted…
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Fed Raises Federal Funds Rate
As expected, the Federal Reserve raised the federal funds rate by 75 basis points as part of its inflation-fighting efforts. Its target range will…
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FTC To Use Algorithms in Bid to Hobble Gig Economy
The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) has announced that it will use its “full authority” to investigate “unfair, deceptive, and anticompetitive practices” by so-called gig…
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The Founding Fathers and Free Trade
There is an ongoing small cottage industry of historical revisionism aimed at showing that America since its founding was friendly to protectionism and that this…
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America Needs an Emergency Declaration to End All Emergency Declarations
Last night President Biden declared on 60 Minutes hat “The pandemic is over.” “If you notice, no one’s wearing masks, everybody seems to…
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This Week in Ridiculous Regulations
CEI hosted its annual Julian Simon dinner on Thursday. The Consumer Price Index gave a mixed picture of inflation. A railroad strike was…
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FTC Goes Back to Bad ‘70s Policies in Motor Vehicle Dealer Rule
Last night at CEI’s annual Julian L. Simon Memorial Award Dinner, CEI celebrated the 1970s—both the fashions and the deregulation toward the end of the…
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FTC Hearing on Vaping Case Shows Antitrust at its Worst
Earlier this week, the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) held a public hearing about a seemingly resolved antitrust case about the vaping market. In 2018,…
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No, We Don’t Need Federal Licenses for Big Tech
In the wake of congressional testimony by former Twitter security chief Peiter Zatko, Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) has suggested that he will partner with…
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Virtual Reality and the Relevant Market Fallacy
The relevant market fallacy is one of the most common analytical mistakes in antitrust policy. One of the first legal questions in an antitrust…
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Inflation Reduction Act and West Virginia v. EPA: Legislative History Refutes Sen. Carper’s Spin
“And whatever interpretive force one attaches to legislative history, the Court normally gives little weight to statements, such as those of the individual legislators, made after the…
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Many Federal Agency Rules and Guidance Documents are Still Not Properly Reported to Congress and the GAO
A 2014 white paper prepared for the Administrative Conference of the United States (ACUS), “Congressional Review Act: Many Recent Final Rules Were Not Submitted…
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The European Union’s Crypto Protectionism Threatens Financial Freedom
Stablecoins, digital assets pegged to a financial asset like the U.S. dollar, are becoming increasingly popular around the globe. Some people use them as…
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Could Heating Costs Set Records This Winter?
Gasoline prices reached their peak at over $5 per gallon last June before declining to the current $3.70, but the worst may be yet…
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Why Railway Unions Oppose the Deal Biden Helped Arrange
The Chamber of Commerce today urged Congress to step in and impose a settlement should talks between the rail industry and the its…
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CEI Leads Coalition Opposing Increased Government Interference in Rail Operations
CEI and 21 other organizations and individuals have signed a letter opposing the misleadingly named Freight Rail Shipping Fair Market Act, which would…
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Mixed News on CPI: Headline Rate Improves, Core Rate Accelerates
The Consumer Price Index (CPI) for August is out. It increased 8.3 percent over the last year, down from 8.5 percent in July. The…
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This Week in Ridiculous Regulations
Queen Elizabeth II passed away at age 96. Meanwhile, in a four-day week, agencies issued new regulations ranging from St. Louis bridges to Atlantic krill…
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Fed Chairman Powell’s Remarks at Cato Monetary Conference
Every year, our friends at the Cato Institute hold a monetary policy conference. This year’s conference opened with Cato President Peter Goettler interviewing Federal…
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Paternalistic FTC Rule Would Stifle Consumer Choice in Auto Market
As if American drivers didn’t face enough headwinds with high gas prices, supply chain constraints, and state rules that may force them out of…
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Pondering the Paradox of the Paltry Proliferation of Prominent Proposed Rules in the Federal Register
Spending is up, the debt is up, and Republicans keep helping raise the debt ceiling. Armageddon does not result, we have learned. On the…
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NLRB Proposes Third Rewrite of Joint Employer Rule in Four Years
As expected, the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) has proposed a new version of the “joint employer” rule, which establishes when a…
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The Inflation Reduction Act’s Implications for West Virginia v. EPA: A Response to Professor Dan Farber
An environmental reporter last week asked for CEI’s thoughts on University of California, Berkley law professor Dan Farber’s article on the Inflation Reduction…
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CEI Leads Coalition Letter Against EPA Interference with Alaska’s Pebble Mine
Mining is one of the relatively few environmentally related issues where federal agencies other than the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) have been given the lead—or…
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Threats to Democracy Posed by an Unleashed Administrative State
President Joe Biden’s much-covered Independence Hall remarks last week have drawn their share of praise, condemnation, and memes. Prominent was Biden’s easy deployment of…
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This Week in Ridiculous Regulations
The labor market continues to look strong, and the Federal Trade Commission lost its attempt to keep an early cancer-detection test off the…
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Starbucks Alleges an NLRB Whistleblower Reveals Election Shenanigans
A challenge by Starbucks to a recent union election overseen by the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) includes a remarkable claim by the company: There…
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Dispelling Misleading Claims about the Inflation Reduction Act and West Virginia v. EPA
In adversarial proceedings, it is seldom prudent to rely on your opponents’ assessment of the outcome. Alas, some conservatives seem inclined to believe Democrats’ self-serving…
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This Week in Ridiculous Regulations
President Biden announced partial student loan forgiveness for people earning up to $125,000. The number of new final regulations this year topped 2,000. Meanwhile, agencies…
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The Fed’s Preferred Inflation Measure Improves, Mixed Picture on Consumer Spending
Two new economic indicators published Friday morning give reason for cautious optimism. The Consumer Price Index (CPI) is the inflation measure that gets the…