CEI’s Battered Business Bureau: The Week in Regulation
As the number of new regulations in 2016 threatens the 1,000 mark, new rules cover everything from rural broadband to flatfish.
On to the data:
- Last week, 61 new final regulations were published in the Federal Register, after 87 the previous week.
- That’s the equivalent of a new regulation every one hour and 45 minutes.
- With 948 final regulations published so far in 2016, the federal government is on pace to issue 3,247 regulations in 2016. Last year’s total was 3,406 regulations.
- Last week, 1,284 new pages were added to the Federal Register, after 2,201 pages the previous week.
- Currently at 22,472 pages, the 2016 Federal Register is on pace for 76,959 pages. The 2015 Federal Register had an adjusted page count of 81,611.
- Rules are called “economically significant” if they have costs of $100 million or more in a given year. Seven such rules have been published so far in 2016, none in the last week.
- The running compliance cost tally for 2016’s economically significant regulations ranges from $629 million to $1.46 billion.
- 78 final rules meeting the broader definition of “significant” have been published this year.
- So far in 2016, 189 new rules affect small businesses; 27 of them are classified as significant.
Highlights from selected final rules published last week:
- FCC officials apparently actually believe price controls can increase rural broadband access. Just in case they are not kidding or being ironic, here are links to short primers on the law of demand and how price ceilings cause shortages. Neither concept is complicated.
- Audits, records, and reporting requirements for infant formula manufacturers—which surely have nothing to do with keeping pesky potential competitors out of the market.
- Financial sanctions against Hizbollah.
- Dairy nepotism.
- Classes of poultry.
- This year’s round of migratory bird hunting regulations continues.
- Alaskan flatfish.
For more data, see Ten Thousand Commandments and follow @10KC and @RegoftheDay on Twitter.