CEI’s Battered Business Bureau: The Week in Regulation

New rules published in the last week include everything from the IRS and Executive Office of the President declaring themselves exempt from select transparency laws, to requirements for observing sea turtles.

On to the data:

• Last week, 68 new final regulations were published in the Federal Register, after 60 new regulations the previous week.
• That’s the equivalent of a new regulation every two hours and 28 minutes.
• So far in 2015, 616 final regulations have been published in the Federal Register. At that pace, there will be a total of 2,852 new regulations this year, which would be nearly 1,000 fewer rules than the usual total.
• Last week, 1,157 new pages were added to the Federal Register, after 1,242 pages the previous week.
• Currently at 15,133 pages, the 2015 Federal Register is on pace for 70,061 pages.
• Rules are called “economically significant” if they have costs of $100 million or more in a given year. Six such rules have been published so far this year, one in the past week.
• The total estimated compliance cost of 2015’s economically significant regulations ranges from $693 million to $746 million for the current year.
• Fifty-nine final rules meeting the broader definition of “significant” have been published so far this year.
• So far in 2015, 127 new rules affect small businesses; 21 of them are classified as significant. 

Highlights from selected final rules published last week:

• The Social Security Administration is revising its rules for providing evidence of disability for people seeking disability benefits.
• The federal government is abolishing its Antiviral Drugs Advisory Committee.
• New rules for reimbursing federal employees for business travel.
• Requirements for observing sea turtles.
• In a move sure to upset transparency hawks from both parties, the Executive Office of the President’s Office of Administration is declaring itself immune to parts of the Freedom of Information Act and other transparency laws.
• The IRS is also declaring its own immunity from certain Privacy Act regulations.
• The rules for sending mail through the U.S. Postal Service.
• Reduced information reporting requirements for light goose hunters.
• New performance standards for wood heaters.

For more data, see Ten Thousand Commandments and follow @10KC and @RegoftheDay on Twitter.