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How a New President Can Roll Back Bureaucracy, Part 7: Track Regulatory Accumulation
This is the seventh entry in a series on how the next president can reduce the scope of bureaucracy. Earlier installments have addressed a freeze on…
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CEI Files Opening Brief in TSA Body Scanner Lawsuit
Yesterday, CEI, The Rutherford Institute, and two CEI employees (VP of Strategy Iain Murray and yours truly) filed our opening brief against the Transportation Security…
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Tom Cotton’s Last Minute Anti-Gambling Bill
Sen. Tom Cotton (R-AR) fears the Internet.
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This Week in Ridiculous Regulations
Agencies issued more than six dozen new final regulations last week, ranging from minerals to dates.
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How a New President Can Roll Back Bureaucracy, Part 6: Enhance Disclosure in ‘Unified Agenda’
There are rules, and then there are rules. Agencies are supposed to alert the public to their priorities in the semi-annual “Regulatory Plan and Unified…
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Surface Transportation Board Seeks to Impose Backdoor Railroad Price Controls
The infamously destructive Interstate Commerce Commission (ICC) may be history, but many outside of the railroad policy world are unfamiliar with its predecessor: the Surface…
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RealClear Radio Hour: Penniless Presidencies and Fashioning America
This week, we discuss two new books covering the national debt crisis and political values with authors Dr. Alan Axelrod and Cathy Lynn Taylor.
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Comment on EPA Power Plan’s Alleged Air Pollution “Co-Benefits”
Climate activists assure us that even if we don’t consider global warming a big problem, we should still support carbon taxes, renewable energy quota, and…
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Obama Readies the Military for Climate Change, Our No. 1 Global Threat
The White House on 21st September released a Presidential Memorandum on Climate Change and National Security. Section 1 states its purpose: “This memorandum establishes a…
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Economics Made the World Great – and Can Make It Even Better
This week our friends at the Mercatus Center at George Mason University hosted their Annual Dinner here in Washington, D.C., and it was an elegant…
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Mr. Robot and the Future of Money
Last week, the cult USA channel TV show Mr. Robot showed once again why it is required viewing for anyone interested in technology.
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Inquiry into Judicial Deference
Deference is judicial respect for agency interpretations of ambiguities in texts that carry the force and effect of law.
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Issues to Watch in Next Week’s Clean Power Plan Oral Argument
Next week the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals hears oral argument on EPA’s so-called Clean Power Plan (CPP), which establishes first-ever carbon dioxide (CO2) emission…
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How a New President Can Roll Back Bureaucracy, Part 5: Scrutinize Informal ‘Guidance’ Documents
When a new president scrutinizes agency rules as we have called for in this series, he or she also needs to bring “guidance documents” under…
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How the Next President Can Improve Labor and Employment Policy
With the presidential election heading into the first debate, what can the next president do to improve national labor and employment policy?…
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Reform of “Toxic Substance” Rules Could Increase Health Risks
Although it was not unwarranted for safety reasons (as I detailed before), TSCA reform has granted the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) greater power to remove…
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A Free Market Response to the Federal Automated Vehicles Policy
The quickest way to slam the brakes on innovation is for bumbling bureaucrats to outlaw it.
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Response to Prof. Aaron Nielson on ‘Auer Deference’
As I’ve discussed before, there is a robust ongoing debate over the propriety of Article III courts giving binding respect to a regulatory agency’s interpretations…
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RIP Reed Larson
Don’t have to pay union dues? You can probably thank Reed Larson.
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Response to Prof. Ronald Levin on ‘Auer Deference’
Last week, I posted about an ongoing symposium at Notice & Comment, regarding Auer deference to agency interpretations of their own regulations.
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Ghost Rules and Dark Matter: Developments in Regulatory Law
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Obama Administration Violates Judicial Independence in Dakota Pipeline Case
Last week, I lambasted the Obama administration for effectively overturning an Article III court decision regarding the Dakota Access Pipeline. Below is a summary of…
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How A New President Can Roll Back Bureaucracy, Part 4: Expand Number of Rules Receiving Cost Analysis
The Office of Management and Budget conducts review of some significant or major rules’ cost-benefit analyses, but not quite as many or as deeply as…
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This Week in Ridiculous Regulations
Agencies issued 78 new regulations last week, ranging from cherries to dairy.
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RealClear Radio Hour: Sensible Science and Authenticity
On this week’s RealClear Radio Hour, Tracey Brown weighs risk, reward, and science, and Glenn Carroll describes authenticity’s paradox.
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Obama’s Worst Power Grab Yet
The $3.7 billion Dakota Access Pipeline is a partially completed project that would move almost 500,000 barrels of oil daily from the Bakken oil fields in…
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House Panel Holds Hearing on Its Power to Investigate New York and Massachusetts AGs
On Wednesday (September 14, 2016), the House Science, Space, and Technology Committee held a hearing on the Committee’s efforts to subpoena documents from the New York…
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Wells Fargo and the Principal-Agent Problem
The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau has celebrated the $100 million fine it has imposed on San Francisco bank Wells Fargo for its employees’ improper handling…
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How a New President Can Roll Back Bureaucracy, Part 3: Review, Revise, Repeal, and Sunset
Short of the moratorium advocated at the top of this series, and in keeping with the spirit of executive orders and retrospective reviews that agencies…
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Appreciate Checks and Balances on Constitution Day
This Constitution Day marks 229 years since the Framers signed the U.S. Constitution following more than four months of debate, votes, and revisions in Philadelphia.
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Sexual Harassment Regulation Expands Federal Bureaucracy
Writing in the California Law Review, Harvard Law School professors Jeannie Suk and Jacob Gersen note that “Today we have an elaborate and growing federal…
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Everything You Should Know about ‘Auer Deference,’ the Most Pressing Issue in Administrative Law
Among the most controversial topics in administrative law is the propriety of Article III courts giving binding deference to agency interpretations of their own regulations.
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How Financial CHOICE Act Rescues Unbanked Americans
If the New York State Department of Labor is really concerned about unbanked employees being hit with fees, it should lend its support to the…
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Arizona Supreme Court Rules Taxpayers Should Be Forced to Subsidize Government Unions
Yesterday, the Arizona Supreme Court determined that there is no better way to spend tax dollars than to give them to government unions so that…
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How a New President Can Roll Back Bureaucracy, Part 2: Boost Resources and Free Market Staff
If we must take the central, top-down administrative state as a given—and it seems that for the time being the Constitution is not coming to…
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When It Comes to Trade Our Leaders, Not Other Countries, Are Ripping Americans off
In recent weeks, trade has repeatedly come up in discussions and speeches by presidential candidates. Donald Trump says he would renegotiate NAFTA, while Hillary Clinton’s…
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Senators Examine Internet Naming Authority
This morning, the Senate Judiciary Committee’s Subcommittee on Oversight, Agency Action, Federal Rights and Federal Courts will hold a hearing entitled “Protecting Internet Freedom: Implications…
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Obama Administration Attacks ‘Reasonableness’ and ‘Common Sense’ in Sex Harassment Investigations
The Supreme Court has repeatedly said that not all sexual flirtation or interaction constitutes sexual harassment, and that whether conduct is bad enough to amount…
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How a New President Can Roll Back Bureaucracy, Part 1: Freeze Regulations Temporarily
In today’s economy, talk about regulatory liberalization has become a bit more bipartisan.
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Clean Power Plan Litigation: A Giant Ball of Uncertainties
Prognosticating judicial outcomes is a foolish endeavor in general, but trying to predict the fate of the Clean Power Plan in Article III courts is…
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Financial CHOICE Act, Replacement for Dodd-Frank, Passes Out of Committee
The House Financial Services Committee today approved the Financial CHOICE Act (FCA) 30-26 largely along party lines.
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Destroying the Marketplace in Education
The federal government happily subsidizes awful state colleges that graduate few if any of their students.
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This Week in Ridiculous Regulations
Despite a Labor Day-shortened work week, agencies still found time to issue regulations from soap to whales.
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RealClear Radio Hour: Criminal Justice Problems and Solutions
This week, I speak with two advocates for criminal justice reform: 33-year police veteran Jim Bueermann and formerly incarcerated entrepreneur Sharon Richardson.
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Climate Change Already Measurably Harming Society, Study Claims
A UC Berkeley study published online this week in the journal Science purports to quantify the current harmful impacts of anthropogenic climate change. According to…
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Senate EPW Takes Gina McCarthy to Task for Broken Promises
During the summer of 2013, the Senate considered Gina McCarthy’s nomination to become head of the EPA. In the course of this deliberation, Republicans on…
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Three Fast Food Favorites from Franchises
It’s no secret that flexibility and freedom to experiment foster creativity.
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EEOC to Gadsden Flag Lovers: Shut Up or Face Costly Lawsuits
Libertarian think tanks have been known to distribute lapel pins that display the Gadsden flag, reading “Don’t Tread on Me.”…
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Michigan State Legislator Introduces Worker’s Choice Bill
Yesterday, a state representative from Michigan introduced novel legislation that would provide public-sector workers’ choice.
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Work Is Changing, Employment Regulation Needs to Change Too
For many people, the 9 to 5, office- or factory-based, corporate job that Dolly Parton lamented in the 1980s is a thing of the past.
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Precedent on Environmental Pacts: Treaty or “Executive Agreement”?
President Obama claims the global climate pact negotiated in Paris last December—the so-called Paris Agreement—is an executive agreement, not a treaty, hence is not subject…
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Senate Democrats Block Anti-Zika Bill Yet Again
Democrats in the Senate have blocked a bill that would have provided federal funds to combat the spread of the Zika virus, reports The Hill.
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Texas Constitution Bans Taxpayer Subsidies to Private Parties
It may seem obvious, but tax dollars are supposed to be used for purely public purposes, not the private benefit of an individual, corporation, or…
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New Drug Price Proposal Light on Competition, Heavy on Bureaucracy
Last Friday, Hillary Clinton announced a new plan to “respond to unjustified price hikes” on certain pharmaceutical drugs.
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Obamacare Shrinks Economy through Medicaid Expansion and Tax Credit Cliffs
Obamacare’s expansion of Medicaid reduced employment in those states that participated in it by a statistically significant extent, according to a recent study by Georgetown’s…
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Rewards and Risks of a Federal Regulatory Budget (Part 6)
By shedding light on comparative agency activity, budgeting and simultaneous improved congressional oversight could counter agency overreach.
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Contingency Lawyers Undermine Integrity of Government Prosecutions
There’s been a lot of press coverage of the Climate Change subpoenas that were issued and then withdrawn by Virgin Islands Attorney General Claude Walker.
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This Week in Ridiculous Regulations
The 2016 Federal Register broke the 60,000-page mark last week, and became the 25th-largest edition in the Register’s 81-year history before Labor Day.
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RealClear Radio Hour: American Indian, EpiPen, and Free Speech Fiascos
In this episode of RealClear Radio Hour, we discuss the fiascos of government overreach and overregulation—on American Indian reservations, in the EpiPen saga, and with…
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Obama Expected To Ratify Paris Treaty in China
U. S. President Barack Obama and Chinese President Xi Jinping will announce that their two countries are officially joining the Paris Climate Treaty when they…
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Rewards and Risks of a Federal Regulatory Budget (Part 5)
Benefits, even more so than costs do not lend themselves to measurement by a third party or external observer, and abuse will result from the…
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Labor Day Highlights Need for Labor Law Reform
Labor Day is a time when we show respect and celebrate the achievements of American workers. However, a better way to respect workers this Labor…
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Reaction to CEI’s Lawsuit against New York Attorney General Schneiderman
Yesterday CEI filed a lawsuit against New York attorney general Eric Schneiderman for refusing to disclose the legal agreements his office made with other state…
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Rewards and Risks of a Federal Regulatory Budget (Part 4)
This week I began by making the case for the idea of a regulatory cost budget but wanted to spend time exploring looming pitfalls and…
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Climate Agreement Signed: What Can The Senate Do?
Reports circulating this week predict that President Obama will unilaterally “Accept” the Paris Climate Treaty on behalf of the United States, breaking from other nations…
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31 Is the Loneliest Number… on the CEI Calendar
We just realized that August 31st is missing from CEI's 2016 Cartoon Calendar.
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Brexit: A Liberal Britain?
There is a great risk in Brexit Britain.
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Rewards and Risks of a Federal Regulatory Budget (Part 3)
Monday in this space, I advocated the idea of a regulatory cost budget but noted there exist looming pitfalls and political traps that could derail…
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Settlement Insurance Shows Need for Court Skepticism in Class Actions
A plaintiffs’ attorney and an insurance executive have created a business, Risk Settlements, that offers a “post-lawsuit settlement insurance product specifically designed to manage settlement…
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Rewards and Risks of a Federal Regulatory Budget (Part 2)
I advocate the idea of a regulatory cost budget but note that there exists looming pitfalls and political traps that could derail it or easily…
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National Right to Work Committee Wrong on Air Traffic Control Reform
The handful of conservative critics of air traffic control reform get the facts all wrong.
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For Affordable Housing, Ditch Prevailing Wage Laws
For residents of some of the nation’s major cities, it’s hardly news that housing costs are high, with little likelihood of their coming down any…
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Rewards and Risks of a Federal Regulatory Budget (Part 1)
Our case for capping and “budgeting” regulatory costs across federal agencies opens by asserting that that, perhaps apart from certain raw compliance and paperwork burdens,…
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This Week in Ridiculous Regulations
In one of their busiest weeks to date, agencies passed more than a hundred new regulations covering everything from rubies to frogs.
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RealClear Radio Hour: Budding CEOs, Women, and Politics
On this week’s episode, Jeff Sandefer tells how children younger than 10 are wowing Shark Tank investors and Sarah Skwire compares the feminism of free…
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New Study Finds Ethanol More Carbon Intensive than Gasoline
A University of Michigan study published in the journal Climatic Change challenges a fundamental assumption of the life cycle analyses underpinning the EPA’s Renewable Fuel…
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Transport Groups Oppose Obama Greenhouse Gas Power Grab
Twenty-three organizations representing highway users, transportation, vehicle, and energy trade associations filed joint comments last weekend opposing any proposal by the Federal Highway Administration (FHWA)…
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California Legislature Passes Ambitious Greenhouse Gas Reduction Target, But Cap-n-Tax Program Remains in Limbo
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Brexit: What’s Next for Trade?
At the moment, Britain is still a member of the European Union, and therefore its trade arrangements are subject to the terms of the EU’s…
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Milwaukee: Get Your Pokémon Off My Lawn!
Milwaukee County’s Park Department is not happy about virtual pocket monsters.
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Problems Ahead for Grad Student Unionizing
There seems to be an Obama administration wide dictate to ensure as many individuals as possible are to be considered employees. The reason for this…
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Federal Subsidies Won’t Promote Fair Housing
Democratic vice presidential candidate Tim Kaine recently outlined his and Hillary Clinton’s plan to promote fair housing. Basically, they want to throw money at the…
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Brexit: What Next?
In our new and revised version of Cutting the Gordian Knot: A Roadmap for British Exit from the European Union, Rory Broomfield and I set…
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Our Fight against Government Intimidation
Regardless of which policies you support, any assault on free speech is profoundly unjust. And when that assault is coordinated by high-ranking government officials, it’s…
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RealClear Radio Hour: Brexit and Regulatory Rebellion
In this week’s episode, Julian Morris, Iain Murray, and Richard Williams make the case for Britain’s regulatory rebellion and chart the path forward from Brexit.
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Can a New President Cut Regulations Unilaterally?
Both presidential candidates have delivered economic speeches over the past two weeks, and both have at least given a nod to red tape and the…
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This Week in Ridiculous Regulations
Friday’s Federal Register was one of the year’s biggest, with 74 agency notices, 4 proposed regulations and 15 final regulations spanning 1,119 pages.
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NLRB’s New Joint Employer Standard Strikes Again
Just about one year ago, the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) dramatically changed the rules on how companies are allowed to contract with other businesses…
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Uber Announces Self-Driving Passenger Pilot, Raises New Regulatory Questions
It was just announced that Uber will soon begin piloting its automated vehicle prototype in Pittsburgh—with passengers. This is not the first automated vehicle…
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Government Wage Mandates Bad for Business and Workers
Wage and hour mandates have seen an uptick of late at the federal, state, and local level.
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Learn Your Workplace Rights with National Employee Freedom Week
The supposedly non-partisan NLRB is woefully inadequate in educating workers on their rights related to opting out of paying full-fledged union dues.
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This Week in Ridiculous Regulations
88 new regulations last week, from poultry improvement to nuclear philosophy.
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RealClear Radio Hour: Taxpayers on the Hook
This week on RealClear Radio Hour, Michael Tanner tallies Uncle Sam’s ballooning entitlement debt and Romina Boccia pulls back the cover on the Beltway crony…
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Celebrating Two Great Economists: Bruce Yandle and Julian Simon
I’d like to second my colleague Fred’s birthday wishes for the distinguished economist Bruce Yandle of Clemson University.
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Happy Birthday to Economist Bruce Yandle
Bruce Yandle – a great economic scholar at Clemson University for many years and recipient of the 2016 Julian Simon Award – reaches his 83rd…
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West Virginia Court Blocks “Right-to-Work” Law, Restricts Worker Choice
Workers in the state to have most recently enacted right to work, West Virginia, have lost their freedom to choose whether or not to financially…
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The Cinematic Legacy of CEI Studios
Over the years we’ve hosted a lot of policy and social events in our current office, but we’ve also written and filmed some creative videos…
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“Comeback” Documents Real-life Americans Overcoming Adversity
House Speaker Paul Ryan (R-WI), and the nonprofit group Opportunity Lives recently hosted a screening of Comeback, a documentary series highlighting the strengths of American…
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Landmark Ruling for Shareholders in Walgreens Class Action Lawsuit
Just weeks before the shareholder vote on Walgreens’ $4.8 billion merger with a European pharmacy, Walgreens got slapped with a class action lawsuit claiming that…
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