This Week in Ridiculous Regulations

Wednesday, the day before the Competitive Enterprise Institute’s 35^th anniversary gala dinner, saw no new final regulations published in the Federal Register. This may be the first non-shutdown Federal Register issue with no new rules since this blog series began tracking such things in 2012 or so. Even so, the 2019 Federal Register is poised to break 30,000 pages this week. Meanwhile, agencies published new regulations ranging from Blazing Paddles to cotton warehouses.

On to the data:

• Last week, 90 new final regulations were published in the Federal Register, after 43 the previous week.
• That’s the equivalent of a new regulation every 1 hour and 52 minutes.
• Federal agencies have issued 1,287 final regulations in 2019. At that pace, there will be 2,682 new final regulations. Last year’s total was 3,367 regulations.
• Last week, agencies published 421 notices, for a total of 10,380 in 2019. At that pace, there will be 21,625 new notices this year. Last year’s total was 22,205.
• Last week, 1,461 new pages were added to the Federal Register, after 1,164 pages the previous week.
• The 2019 Federal Register totals 29,027 pages. It is on pace for 60,473 pages. The 2018 total was 68,082 pages. The all-time record adjusted page count (which subtracts skips, jumps, and blank pages) is 96,994, set in 2016.
• Rules are called “economically significant” if they have costs of $100 million or more in a given year. One such rule has been published this year. Six such rules were published in 2018.
• The running compliance cost tally for 2019’s economically significant regulations currently ranges from $139.1 million to $175.8 million. The 2018 total ranges from $220.1 million to $2.54 billion, depending on discount rates and other assumptions.
• Agencies have published 33 final rules meeting the broader definition of “significant” so far this year. 2018’s total was 108 significant final rules.
• So far in 2019, 229 new rules affect small businesses; 12 of them are classified as significant. 2018’s totals were 660 rules affecting small businesses, with 29 of them significant.

Highlights from last week’s new final regulations:

• A correction to an earlier regulation for sheep and goat scrapie.
• Tax rules for small business trusts with nonresident aliens as beneficiaries.
• Busy week at the Federal Drug Administration. Thiafentanil is now a Schedule II controlled substance. Solriamfetol is now Schedule IV, as is brexanolone.
• Safety standards for stationary activity centers.
• Government-guaranteed profit margins for dairy farmers.
• The Coast Guard is establishing a temporary safety zone around the Blazing Paddles boat race in the Cuyahoga River near Cleveland.
• New car title loan regulations.
• The Department of Health and Human Services is removing outdated regulations for its Health Education Assistance Loan (HEAL) program and the National Hansen’s Disease Program.
• The National Park Service is removing some outdated regulations for the Delaware Water Gap National Recreation Area.
• The Food and Drug Administration is changing its in-house definition of “small business” for certain food producer regulations.
• Delivery and shipping standards for cotton warehouses.

For more data, see Ten Thousand Commandments and follow @10KC and @RegoftheDay on Twitter.