The Open Market Blog

• By: Ryan Young
• 05/26/2020

In an op-ed in National Review, CEI Senior Fellow Ryan Young takes a look at President Trump’s new Executive Order directing agencies to get rid…

Regulatory Reform

• By: Ryan Young
• 05/26/2020

President Trump issued an Executive Order encouraging agencies to keep #NeverNeeded regulations waived during the coronavirus permanently off the books. Meanwhile, regulatory agencies issued new…

Regulatory Reform

• By: Ryan Young
• 05/18/2020

Retail sales declined 16.4 percent in April, setting a new record low for the second month in a row. Congress returned to Washington, putting the…

Regulatory Reform

• By: Ryan Young
• 05/11/2020

The first full week of May featured a continuing pandemic, the biggest unemployment increase in U.S. history, a hailstorm in the D.C. area, freezing temperatures…

Regulatory Reform

• By: Ryan Young
• 05/04/2020

The 2020 Federal Register passed 25,000 pages, and is poised to surpass last year’s page count by more than 1,000 pages. The number of final…

Regulatory Reform

• By: Ryan Young
• 04/27/2020

New unemployment applications were down to 4.4 million last week. This is still more than an order of magnitude greater than the pre-coronavirus record. With…

Regulatory Reform

• By: Ryan Young
• 04/24/2020

President Trump has deferred selected tariff payments for companies experiencing coronavirus-related hardship. It came after more than two weeks of starts, stops, denials, and reversals.

Trade and International

• By: Ryan Young
• 04/23/2020

Policy makers have already waived more than 350 regulations and counting that were slowing the pandemic response and harming economic recovery. But with a 185,000-page…

Regulatory Reform

• By: Ryan Young
• 04/20/2020

Please do all you can to keep yourself and your loved ones safe. Hopefully Congress will also act on some of the #NeverNeeded regulations that…

Regulatory Reform

• By: Ryan Young
• 04/16/2020

California’s AB5 law was already backfiring before the COVID-19 pandemic hit. It has cost thousands of jobs—many of which are home-based. During a time of…

Labor and Employment

• By: Ryan Young
• 04/13/2020

When Congress convenes next week, it will likely begin work on a Phase 4 stimulus bill. CEI analysts have made the case that addressing #NeverNeeded…

Regulatory Reform

• By: Ryan Young
• 04/09/2020

In a new op-ed in RealClearMarkets, Iain Murray and Ryan Young outline the major points of CEI’s just-released #NeverNeeded paper, which identifies regulations harmful to…

Consumer Well-Being

• By: Ryan Young
• 04/06/2020

Quarantine and stay-at-home orders will likely last through the end of April in many places. In more heartening news, governments are rolling back numerous #NeverNeeded…

Regulatory Reform

• By: Ryan Young
• 04/01/2020

In a new Washington Examiner op ed, CEI Senior Fellow Ryan Young proposes a Regulatory Reduction Commission to act as a permanent watchdog to prevent #NeverNeeded…

Regulatory Reform

• By: Ryan Young
• 03/30/2020

Coronavirus deaths topped 1,000 in the U.S. last week, while new cases continued to double every few days. Meanwhile, agencies issued new final regulations ranging…

Regulatory Reform

• By: Ryan Young
• 03/23/2020

Governments are responding to the coronavirus with a getting rid of harmful regulations on restaurants, schools, and stores. Most of these rules were never needed…

Regulatory Reform

• By: Ryan Young
• 03/16/2020

It was a rough week. Coronavirus infections and deaths continued to climb. Wall Street is officially in a bear market, and Congress and President Trump…

Regulatory Reform

• By: Ryan Young
• 03/09/2020

Coronavirus continued to spread, the Democratic presidential field significantly narrowed, and the former head of the UAW was charged with embezzlement. Meanwhile, agencies issued new…

Regulatory Reform

• By: Ryan Young
• 03/02/2020

The coronavirus outbreak began to infect financial markets as well as people, with stock markets having their worst week since at least 2008. The number…

Regulatory Reform

• By: Ryan Young
• 02/27/2020

By far the most common criticism of minimum wages is that they cost jobs.

Labor and Employment

• By: Ryan Young
• 02/24/2020

During the four-day week, Lawrence Tesler passed away. The underappreciated inventor created the cut, copy, and paste functions on computers. The Hair Club for Men…

Regulatory Reform

• By: Ryan Young
• 02/18/2020

Spring Training began for all 30 Major League Baseball teams, bringing joy across the nation. Meanwhile, agencies issued new final regulations ranging from grains ounce…

Regulatory Reform

• By: Ryan Young
• 02/13/2020

California’s Assembly Bill 5 (AB5) is intended to classify more independent contractors as formal employees. The goal is for workers to get higher wages and…

Labor and Employment

• By: Ryan Young
• 02/10/2020

The impeachment trial ended the way everyone expected, the State of the Union address happened, and the coronavirus outbreak intensified. Agencies issued new final regulations…

Regulatory Reform

• By: Ryan Young
• 02/03/2020

The House of Representatives is expected to vote this week on the Protecting the Right to Organize (PRO) Act. The legislation would essentially nullifies 28…

Labor and Employment

• By: Ryan Young
• 02/03/2020

The impeachment trial continued, Brexit happened, President Trump signed the USMCA trade agreement, and the 2020 Federal Register topped 5,000 pages. Agencies issued new final…

Regulatory Reform

• By: Ryan Young
• 01/27/2020

The Federal Register had a four-day week due to Martin Luther King Day, but agencies still found time to issue new final regulations ranging from…

Regulatory Reform

• By: Ryan Young
• 01/21/2020

In a busy week, President Trump signed Phase One of a trade agreement with China on Wednesday. On Thursday, the Senate ratified the USMCA trade…

Regulatory Reform

• By: Ryan Young
• 01/16/2020

The USMCA trade agreement passed the Senate today. USMCA is valuable damage control. Three years of unpredictable tariff increases, threats of increases, and diplomatic tensions…

Trade and International

• By: Ryan Young
• 01/15/2020

Phase One of a trade deal with China has enormous value as damage control against further tariffs, but it comes at a cost. The Trump…

Trade and International

• By: Ryan Young
• 01/13/2020

Twenty four states rang in 2020 with minimum wage increases. Most of the increases are modest, so the tradeoffs will be, too. But there was…

Labor and Employment

• By: Ryan Young
• 01/13/2020

The new year started off with a literal bang, though as of this writing the worst Iran scenario seems to have been avoided. The Senate…

Regulatory Reform

• By: Ryan Young
• 01/06/2020

Happy New Year, everyone. We’re doing a slightly different format this week, on account of the new year starting mid-week. With just two days’ worth…

Regulatory Reform

• By: Ryan Young
• 12/31/2019

Happy New Year, everyone. Now that 2019 is in the books, we have some data on how much new regulation hit the books. Note that…

Regulatory Reform

• By: Ryan Young
• 12/30/2019

Federal workers got a three-day week as a Christmas present this year. Agencies still put out 323 notices, 50 proposed regulations, and 1,342 Federal Register…

Regulatory Reform

• By: Ryan Young
• 12/23/2019

Congress finished the year with a bang. In a two day span the House impeached the president and passed the USMCA trade agreement. Both chambers…

Regulatory Reform

• By: Ryan Young
• 12/16/2019

Britain held a major election, and the U.S. House of Representatives is set to impeach President Trump. At the same time, Trump is poised for…

Regulatory Reform

• By: Ryan Young
• 12/13/2019

As of Friday, December 13th, the U.S. and Chinese governments have agreed in principle to phase one of a trade agreement. The Chinese government will…

Trade and International

• By: Iain Murray, Ryan Young
• 12/12/2019

The Competitive Enterprise Institute (CEI) today announced its opposition to the USMCA trade agreement between the United States, Mexico, and Canada because the updated agreement…

Trade and International

• By: Ryan Young
• 12/09/2019

The House began preparing articles of impeachment, President Trump announced new tariffs against three allies, a NATO summit was surprisingly contentious, and the federal government…

Regulatory Reform

• By: Ryan Young
• 12/02/2019

While the nation celebrated Thanksgiving with family and friends, rulemaking agencies published new regulations ranging from almond information to missile accidents.

Regulatory Reform

• By: Ryan Young
• 11/25/2019

Congress averted a government shutdown until December 20th by passing a continuing resolution. The Fall 2019 Unified Agenda was also released, which compiles all rulemaking…

Regulatory Reform

• By: Ryan Young
• 11/18/2019

The 2019 Federal Register has already exceeded its page count during President Trump’s first year in office, with more than a month to spare and…

Regulatory Reform

• By: Ryan Young
• 11/11/2019

Philip Thompson and Lorenzo Montanari have compiled a Trade Barrier Index, just released by the Property Rights Alliance. The U.S. currently ranks 54th out of…

Trade and International

• By: Ryan Young
• 11/11/2019

The number of new regulations this year passed 2,500 last week, and the Federal Register surpassed 60,000 pages. This week could see big news on…

Regulatory Reform

• By: Ryan Young
• 11/07/2019

America’s trade policy landscape has some big events on the horizon. The House of Representatives will vote next week on Rep. Maxine Waters’ (D-CA) Export-Import…

Trade and International

• By: Ryan Young
• 11/04/2019

Washington had one of its best weeks in recent memory. The Nationals won the World Series, and Congress is taking the next two weeks off.

Regulatory Reform

• By: Ryan Young
• 11/01/2019

It is busy a time right now in the Export-Import Bank reauthorization battle. Rep. Maxine Waters (D-CA) introduced a new bill to reauthorize the Export-Import…

Banking and Finance

• By: Ryan Young
• 10/29/2019

Halloween is this week. That means costumes, spooky decorations, trick-or-treating, and pumpkin spice everything. The Code of Federal Regulations contains several rules to keep everything…

Regulatory Reform

• By: Ryan Young
• 10/28/2019

The Washington Nationals made it to the World Series, and the White House canceled some of its newspaper subscriptions. Meanwhile, rulemaking agencies published new regulations…

Regulatory Reform

• By: Ryan Young
• 10/21/2019

Last week’s big stories included a thickening impeachment plot, Energy Secretary Rick Perry’s resignation, and a letter written to the president of Turkey. In a…

Regulatory Reform

• By: Ryan Young
• 10/15/2019

The latest Mad Libs-style political feud involves the NBA, the television cartoon South Park, and the Chinese government. President Trump also issued a pair of…

Regulatory Reform

• By: Ryan Young
• 10/07/2019

Non-impeachment news involved a major court ruling on net neutrality, plus a new tariff. This year’s Federal Register is on pace to surpass last year’s…

Regulatory Reform

• By: Ryan Young
• 10/02/2019

Congress nearly increased the federal minimum wage from $7.25 to $15 per hour this year. Though the Raise the Wage Act is unlikely to pass…

Labor and Employment

• By: Ryan Young
• 09/30/2019

Congress is out of session for the next two weeks, and the impeachment investigation will likely dominate headlines for some time to come. Meanwhile, the…

Regulatory Reform

• By: Ryan Young
• 09/23/2019

For all its flaws, the Export-Import Bank’s charter gets an important thing right: the agency must be reauthorized every few years, or it will close.

Banking and Finance

• By: Ryan Young
• 09/23/2019

The House passed a continuing resolution to avoid a federal shutdown until November 21st. The Senate will likely follow suit this week. The 2019 Federal…

Regulatory Reform

• By: Ryan Young
• 09/20/2019

The Export-Import Bank’s charter is currently set to expire on September 30. If authorization lapses, the agency will shut down. On Thursday, the House passed…

Banking and Finance

• By: Ryan Young
• 09/19/2019

Nobel laureate economist Ronald Coase wrote in his 1975 essay “Economists and Public Policy” that “An economist who, by his efforts, is able to postpone…

Banking and Finance

• By: Ryan Young
• 09/16/2019

Congress returned from recess, the Democratic presidential candidates had a debate, and the 2019 federal deficit topped $1 trillion with a month left to go…

Regulatory Reform

• By: Ryan Young
• 09/09/2019

Contrary to my earlier prediction, the number of new regulations this year did not pass 2,000 last week, ending the four-day week at 1,991. Meanwhile,…

Regulatory Reform

• By: Ryan Young
• 09/05/2019

Early in the Trump administration, a series of executive orders slowed the growth of new regulations and removed some existing rules. From the start of…

Regulatory Reform

• By: Ryan Young
• 09/02/2019

The UK parliament will soon be suspended for a five-week period, something the U.S. Congress should consider emulating as often as possible. Over in the…

Regulatory Reform

• By: Ryan Young
• 08/26/2019

A humorous diplomatic row over Greenland was not the only news of the week, with China tariffs, divisive rhetoric, and recession fears also putting in…

Regulatory Reform

• By: Ryan Young
• 08/19/2019

Last week was the Federal Register’s busiest of the year, with its 3,075 pages almost tripling a normal week’s count. A new economically significant regulation…

Regulatory Reform

• By: Ryan Young
• 08/12/2019

Rumblings of a “Navarro recession” are growing louder, and the 2019 Federal Register will likely crack the 40,000-page mark early this week. Rulemaking agencies published…

Regulatory Reform

• By: Ryan Young
• 08/05/2019

In a pre-recess Parthian shot, the Senate passed a massive new spending bill that would increase federal spending by $320 billion over two years and…

Regulatory Reform

• By: Ryan Young
• 07/29/2019

Congress has adjourned for its August recess, so the republic is safe for another month. Rulemaking agencies are still on the job, however, and published…

Regulatory Reform

• By: Ryan Young
• 07/22/2019

The Raise the Wage Act, which passed the House on Thursday, would raise the federal minimum wage to $15 by 2025. The bill now moves…

Labor and Employment

• By: Ryan Young
• 07/22/2019

Washington, D.C.’s flash flood was followed up by a heat wave; this week could bring even worse during Congress’ final week in session before the…

Regulatory Reform

• By: Ryan Young
• 07/15/2019

Washington, D.C. was hit by a flash flood, but agencies were still able to publish new regulations ranging from electric program procedures to Fort Ord…

Regulatory Reform

• By: Ryan Young
• 07/08/2019

It was a four-day week for the federal government as the nation celebrated Independence Day. Meanwhile, agencies published new regulations ranging from the Paper and…

Regulatory Reform

• By: Ryan Young
• 07/01/2019

The 2019 Federal Register broke 30,000 pages last week, the Democratic presidential candidates had their first debates, and the U.S. and Chinese governments prepared for…

Regulatory Reform