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As Election Nears, NYT Makes Another Push for Groupthink
The New York Times on October 27 ran an article titled “As Election Nears, Trump Makes Final Push Against Climate Science.” The article spotlights President Trump’s recent appointments…
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Democrats More at Risk for Anti-E-Cigarette Stance
Millions of adult vapers across the country could determine the outcome of the election in battleground states. According to Gallup, about 8 percent of…
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Record GDP Numbers Need Context: Good news, but More to Do
Most of the talk about today’s GDP numbers will be related to the election. It shouldn’t. Presidents don’t run the economy; hundreds of millions…
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New CEI Paper: Antitrust Policy in Europe, Lessons for America
Today, CEI is releasing a new paper on antitrust policy in the European Union by Swiss competition commissioner Henrique Schneider. Europe’s approach to competition…
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Big Government Won’t Protect the Oceans; Markets Will
Last week, Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Administrator Andrew Wheeler announced a U.S. effort to address plastic litter buildup in oceans and other waters. The desire…
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FCC Takes Another Step away from Net Neutrality
After 15 years of unrelenting regulation and litigation, the days of net neutrality as a live policy issue in Washington may be numbered. At its…
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Department of Labor’s Radical New Concept: Innocent until Proven Guilty
The Labor Department has an interesting new idea: only publicly shame companies when it is clear that they have made serious violations of the law.
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Court Ruling Could Kill Uber and Lyft in California
A California appeals court ruling caps a crusade against ride-sharing apps in the state. Just days before Californians themselves were set to decide on…
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This Week in Ridiculous Regulations
In the news last week, the Justice Department filed an antitrust case against Google. It is the highest-profile antitrust case since the 1998-2002 Microsoft case.
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Comments to EPA’s Proposed Aircraft GHG Rule Show Industry Support, Activist Opposition
The comment period for the Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) proposed first-ever greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions standards for commercial aircraft ended on October 19. There…
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Boeing Declines to Blackmail Washington Taxpayers, Threatened by Governor in Return
Boeing recently announced plans to consolidate all production of its 787 Dreamliner jet, moving some existing work from the company’s traditional home in Washington…
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Not the Strongest Case: DOJ’s Google Antitrust Complaint
On Tuesday, the Department of Justice (DOJ) filed an antitrust complaint against Google. It marks the beginning of the first major monopolization case since the…
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How Could We Have Known: Prohibiting E-cigarettes Leads to Smuggling and Smoking
Anyone with a passing knowledge of American history is aware of the failures of prohibition. Both the now-repealed ban on alcohol and the ongoing “war…
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NHTSA’s Consistent Understanding that California’s Tailpipe GHG Standards Are Unlawful
October 27 is the deadline for submitting final legal briefs to the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals in Union of Concerned Scientists v. National Highway…
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How Could We Have Known: Prohibiting E-cigarettes Leads to Smuggling and Smoking
Anyone with a passing knowledge of American history is aware of the failures of prohibition. Both the now-repealed ban on alcohol and the ongoing “war…
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This Week in Ridiculous Regulations
It was a four-day week due to Columbus Day or Indigenous People’s Day—the controversy over which was just one of the things people were outraged…
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Federal Energy Regulatory Commission Calls for Carbon Pricing
The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) on October 15 proposed a policy statement to (1) “clarify its jurisdiction” over Regional Transmission Organization (RTO) and…
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FinCEN Files Shows Regulatory and Privacy Concerns with the Bank Secrecy Act and the Necessity for Reform or Repeal
Last month, BuzzFeed News published an investigative report that alleged that banks sat on their hands while criminals laundered trillions of dollars over the…
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Supreme Court Nominee Barrett in Senate Testimony Alarms Climate Alarmists
Supreme Court nominee Amy Coney Barrett was asked repeatedly about her views on climate change at her Senate confirmation hearing this week. Unsurprisingly, her unwillingness…
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Warming Nights, Longer Growing Seasons, and a Greener Planet
Dozens of recent news stories note newly published research showing that night temperatures are rising faster than daytime readings. Despite this “asymmetric” warming, there…
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A Brief Note on Airplane, Clouds, and Global Warming
We recently linked to a new paper by D.S. Lee of Manchester Metropolitan University (U.K.), along with 20 coauthors, on global aviation and climate…
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New CEI Report: Making Sure a COVID-19 Vaccine Is Used
One or more COVID-19 vaccines will likely be approved in the next few months. But this scientific achievement may prove to be the easy part.
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Fed’s Community Reinvestment Act Reform Proposal Is a Step in the Wrong Direction
Last month, the Federal Reserve released a preliminary proposal to update the Community Reinvestment Act (CRA). The Fed’s proposal, spearheaded by Obama-appointed Fed Governor Lael…
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Students Need More Air Conditioning, Not More Climate Policy
There’s a long and growing list of problems activists blame on climate change, including students’ reduced ability to learn due to hotter classroom temperatures. However,…
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Forty Years of Freedom: Rail Deregulation Worked
Forty years ago today, President Carter signed the Staggers Act, which deregulated the American freight rail industry. As CEI has long maintained, this…
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Fans of California’s AB5 Are Drunk with Power, MADD Warns
Mothers Against Drunk Driving (MADD) is urging Californians to abolish AB5, the state law supposedly meant to prevent worker misclassification by employers. The nonprofit public…
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Tit-for-Tat Tariffs Don’t Work: Boeing and Airbus Show Why
A 16 year-long aerospace subsidies dispute between the United States and the European Union began another round this week. The U.S. claims that the EU’s…
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Labor Department Proposes Letting Rank and File Union Members Watch over their Organizations
The Department of Labor (DOL) announced today that it wants to update rules to require private sector unions to be more transparent in…
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This Week in Ridiculous Regulations
It was another volatile pre-election week. A still-symptomatic President Trump returned to the White House from Walter Reed hospital during prime time. More key staffers…
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The House Judiciary’s Antitrust Reports and Predatory Pricing
It is human nature to fear what we do not understand. And if there is anything politicians do not understand, it is markets. This is…
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Jean-Baptiste Say on Manufacturing Nostalgia and Industrial Policy
In his 1803 A Treatise on Political Economy, Jean-Baptiste Say writes: "Production is the creation, not of matter, but of utility." That captures one of…
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Court-Packing Isn’t the Left’s Only Threat to the Supreme Court
The Left’s threat to the pack the Court by expanding the number of justices seems to be unpopular. But they have proposed other policies that…
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Pension Managers Must Focus on Retiree Security, Not Politics
A new proposed rule from the Department of Labor on pension funds would clarify the responsibilities of pension fund fiduciaries covered under the Employee Retirement…
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Louisiana Frog Feud Illustrates Regulatory Threat to Property Rights and Economic Freedom
The dusky gopher frog doesn’t grow very large—only to about three inches long, on average. But despite its diminutive size, this little frog has had…
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This Week in Ridiculous Regulations
President Trump’s COVID-19 diagnosis marked the first of what will likely be many October surprises. Congress agreed on one spending bill to avoid another shutdown,…
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Up to 75 Percent of Uber Drivers Would Lose Work If They Were Classified as Employees
If organized labor and its allies in government are successful in their bid to force so-called gig economy companies like Uber and Lyft to treat…
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EPA Encourages Innovation, Levels Playing Field for Sources Reducing Hazardous Air Emissions
The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) on October 1 finalized a rule to implement the clear language of Section 112 of the…
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New CFPB Reports Find Consumer Credit Resiliency During the COVID-19 Pandemic
Recent research from the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) has found that consumers have not experienced significant increases in negative credit outcomes as a result…
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In Debate, Biden Confirms That He Is for and Against the Green New Deal
Climate science and energy policy made a surprise appearance during the first presidential debate on September 29 in Cleveland. Moderator Chris Wallace had not included climate…
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Amazon Claims Worker COVID-19 Infection Rates below Norm
Amazon’s critics have made a point of saying the company is endangering its employees by keeping its fulfillment centers active during the COVID-19…
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EPA Chooses Scientific Approach on Chlorpyrifos: Supports Transparency, Rejects Junk Science
Green groups are upset because the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) decided to rely on science, rather than environmentalist hype, in its draft risk assessment…
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Closing the Loop on Sea Level Rise
Sea level rise is potentially the most important consequence of manmade climate change. The global mean sea level has been rising since the great continental ice-age…
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CEI Presents the 2020 Julian L. Simon Award to Dr. Steven Horwitz
On September 30, the Competitive Enterprise Institute presented its 2020 Julian L. Simon Memorial Award to Dr. Steven Horwitz, Director of the Institute for the…
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FCC Approves More Critical Mid-Band Spectrum for 5G
Today, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) held a meeting where the commissioners voted to adopt two orders that will make more spectrum available for…
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Finally, a Fix for Fannie and Freddie
In my recent blog post on the 10th anniversary of Dodd-Frank, I lamented that while “this supposed ‘financial reform’ has caused harmful and sometimes…
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New Junk Food Ordinance: Another “Feel Good” California Law that Does No Good
California is a tough place to live. Ranked as the state with the nation’s worst quality of life, Californians have the biggest debt-to-income ratio, suffer…
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New York’s School Principals Try to Flunk the Mayor
The problem with public sector unions is that they represent not just the workers for a government entity but also the elected leaders’ constituents. That…
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California’s Proposed Mini-CFPB Is Cronyist and Ill-Conceived
Earlier this month, the California Legislature passed the California Consumer Financial Protection Law (CCFPL) to create a new state-based regulatory agency modeled after the federal Consumer…
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Yes, Ridesharing Is Mainly a Part-Time Gig
The vast majority of people who drive for rideshare company Uber in California do so for less than 40 hours or less a week. That’s…
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House Oversight Subcommittee Holds Climate Policy Hearing
On September 24, 2020, the House Oversight Subcommittee on Environment held a hearing titled “Climate Change Part IV: Moving Towards a…