CEI’s Battered Business Bureau: The Week In Regulation

Just another week in the world of regulation:

  • Fifty-one new final rules were published during the Labor Day-shortened week, down from 74 the previous week.
  • That’s the equivalent of a new regulation every 3 hours and 17 minutes — 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.
  • All in all, 2,632 final rules have been published in the Federal Register this year.
  • If this keeps up, the total tally for 2012 will be 3,839 new rules.
  • Last week, 1,641 new pages were added to the 2012 Federal Register, for a total of 55,324 pages.
  • At its current pace, the 2012 Federal Register will run 79,489 pages.
  • Rules are called “economically significant” if they have costs of $100 million or more in a given year. The 35 such rules published so far in 2012 have compliance costs of at least $17.3 billion. Two of the rules do not have cost estimates, and a third cost estimate does not give a total annual cost. We assume that rules lacking this basic transparency measure cost the bare minimum of $100 million per year. The true cost is almost certainly higher.
  • Four economically significant rules were published last week.
  • So far, 266 final rules that meet the broader definition of “significant” have been published in 2012.
  • So far this year, 964 final rules affect small business. 71 of them are significant rules.

Highlights from final rules published last week:

For more data, go to TenThousandCommandments.com.