Costly Regulations

From Chris Woodward's column on OneNewsNow:

With already 600 new regulations in 2012, a fellow in regulatory studies says the United States continues to be a nation of regulations.

Ryan Young of the Competitive Enterprise Institute (CEI), who compiled the data, says 600 regulations since the first of the year is equivalent to a new regulation passing every hour and 53 minutes.

"If it keeps up at this pace, we're going to see nearly 3,500 new regulations just in 2012," he estimates.

Though that figure is actually down slightly from recent years, Young asserts that the regulations still put a huge weight on the economy.

"They don't provide cost estimates for the 'economically significant rules' — that means a rule that costs $100 million or more," he explains. "We've seen nine of those, or maybe two a week, and those nine rules alone cost a little over $15 billion …"

And even though many of the remaining regulations have yet to receive cost estimates, Young does not expect this issue to get much media attention.

"Most of the media covers taxes and spending. Well, regulation is just as important," he contends. "It costs a total of $1.7 trillion a year."

He notes that CEI tries to emphasize regulation as a hidden tax through its weekly "Battered Business Bureau" series, its annual report called "Ten Thousand Commandments," and the information it releases daily showing that "regulation is a burden, and we try and lighten that burden."