This Week in Ridiculous Regulations   

As tempers flared over how many “chuggas” to say before “choo-choo,” the 2019 Federal Register topped the 10,000-page mark last week and the number of new final regulations passed 500. Meanwhile, rulemaking agencies issued new regulations ranging from swap transactions to liquid mail.

On to the data:

• Last week, 59 new final regulations were published in the Federal Register, after 69 the previous week.
• That’s the equivalent of a new regulation every two hours and 51 minutes.
• Federal agencies have issued 506 final regulations in 2019. At that pace, there will be 2,259 new final regulations. Last year’s total was 3,367 regulations.
• Last week, agencies published 511 notices, for a total of 4,396 in 2019. At that pace, there will be 19,625 new notices this year. Last year’s total was 22,205.
• Last week, 1,277 new pages were added to the Federal Register, after 1,102 pages the previous week.
• The 2019 Federal Register totals 10,969 pages. It is on pace for 48,969 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 18 final rules meeting the broader definition of “significant” so far this year. 2018’s total was 108 significant final rules.
• So far in 2019, 98 new rules affect small businesses; 5 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 tax cut for California kiwi growers.
• A tax increase for California date growers.
• An amendment to Marketing Order 929 for cranberries.
• An amendment to Marketing Order 959 for Texas onions.
• New rules for swap transactions.
• Don’t fly over Tripoli, Libya.
• Two new rules for the Defense Department’s various ROTC programs.
• Removal of a labeling requirement for slaughtered livestock if they will be further processed in the same facility.
• Mailing liquids.
• Project cost and annual limits for natural gas pipelines.
• A correction to a recent rule for Class A and B CDLs.
• The Federal Emergency Management Agency issued guidelines for factors to consider when a state’s governor requests for individual assistance for a major disaster.
• An update to Medicare fraud prevention.

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