The primary focus of the Competitive Enterprise Institute since its founding in 1984 has been to promote deregulation. Government regulation of the economy blocks innovation and wealth creation. It also encourages damaging behavior such as rent-seeking and cronyism. Finally, it crowds out more effective forms of regulation such as market discipline.
The beneficial effects of deregulation were plain in the airline and freight rail industries. Deregulation begun in the Carter administration led to more flights at lower cost and to better rail infrastructure and much lower shipping costs. Yet, since the 1990s, successive administrations of different political stripes have piled on regulations, burdening the economy needlessly. We chart this problem every year in our Ten Thousand Commandments report.
The power of regulators now raises constitutional concerns. Regulators are often unaccountable, and their insulation from the checks and balances of the constitutional system suggests that they may in effect form a fourth branch of government. The use of guidance documents to avoid rulemaking procedures, for instance, can amount to government by decree. Deregulation is therefore essential to restore good constitutional order.
CEI advocates for both overall regulatory reform – changing the ways in which rules are made to make them more transparent and easier to remove – and for specific regulatory changes. Recent successes include recognition of our concerns in Executive Orders promoting deregulation and curtailing the use of guidance, and in the reflection of our comments in rules promulgated by agencies such as the Department of Labor and the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau.
Deregulation Issue Areas
Featured Posts
Blog
Some Good Tariff News
I’ve written before about the 17-year-long dispute between the United States and the European Union over Boeing and Airbus subsidies. Each jurisdiction has placed…
Blog
Congress Should Read the Fine Print on Sami’s Law
Whether a person is an employee of an app-based ridesharing company like Uber or Lyft under U.S. law has been a major hot button issue.
News Release
U.S. Economy Added 379,000 Jobs in Feb. 2021 – Small Progress, Further Steps Needed
Today the Labor Department released national unemployment figures for the month of February 2021, revealing not much has changed in a month. February’s unemployment rate…
Studies
EPA Should Revise Its Assessment of Medical Supply Sterilant
The COVID-19 crisis is a stark reminder of the importance of maintaining critical medical supplies. Not only must policy makers ensure that the market is…
The Double Standards of Cannabis and Nicotine
View Full Document as PDF Executive Summary The principal benefit of recreational cannabis, as the name implies, is recreation. Many who enjoy using…
Repeal or Reform the Jones Act
The COVID-19 pandemic has triggered the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression. Tens of millions have lost their jobs. Unleashing the innovation and productivity…
Blog
Leveraging the Congressional Review Act to Shield Rather than Discipline Regulation
While the Congressional Review Act (CRA) was strongly bipartisan when it passed in 1996, supported by then-Sen. Harry Reid (D-NV) and others…
This Week in Ridiculous Regulations
COVID-19 cases are finally in decline as vaccinations continue, to the point where there is reason for cautious optimism. Congress was busy with a stimulus…
Alternate Minimum Wage Proposal Suggests Punishing Business Is the Real Goal
Fans of raising the federal minimum wage to $15 an hour have come up with a workaround for the Senate Parliamentarian’s ruling Thursday that that…
News
Senate Should Question Biden SEC, CFPB Nominees About Needed Constraints on Regulators
Today, the Senate Banking Committee is considering President Biden’s nomination of both Gary Gensler to head the SEC and Rohit Chopra to head the CFPB.
Richard Morrison Statement on the Confirmation Hearing of Gary Gensler to Be SEC Chair
Senior Fellow Richard Morrison reacted to the confirmation hearing of Gary Gensler to be SEC Chair: “Chairman-designate Gensler’s prepared remarks for today’s confirmation hearing…
Federal Minimum Wage Hike will Force Cuts Elsewhere
With the Democrat-controlled Congress aiming to imminently pass a plan to increase the federally-mandated minimum wage from $7.25 to $15 per hour nationwide as part…
Op-Eds
The Washington Examiner
The Secret History of the Minimum Wage Movement
As congressional Democrats push to raise the federal minimum wage to $15 an hour, it’s worth asking where that figure came from. Why $15 (more…
The Hill
The Problem With A One-Size-Fits-All Federal Minimum Wage Hike
Minimum wage mandates aren’t free. They force employers to make difficult decisions and tradeoffs. When government forces wages up, non-wage pay goes down: Workers get…
National Review
Voluntary ESG Disclosures Not Enough for the Feds
Dozens of companies, including some of the best-known consumer brands, recently signed on to a new system of rules for reporting on environmental, social,…
Staff & Scholars
John Berlau
Senior Fellow
- Banking and Finance
- Deregulation
- Financial Regulation
Clyde Wayne Crews
Vice President for Policy and Senior Fellow
- Business and Government
- Consumer Freedom
- Deregulation
Sean Higgins
Research Fellow
- Deregulation
- Labor and Employment
Sam Kazman
General Counsel
- Antitrust
- Automobiles and Roads
- Banking and Finance
Kent Lassman
President and CEO
- Capitalism
- Deregulation
- Innovation
Marlo Lewis, Jr.
Senior Fellow
- Climate
- Energy
- Energy and Environment
Angela Logomasini
Senior Fellow
- Chemical Risk
- Consumer Freedom
- Energy and Environment
Michelle Minton
Senior Fellow
- Consumer Freedom
- Consumer Product Safety
- Consumer Well-Being
Iain Murray
Vice President for Strategy and Senior Fellow
- Banking and Finance
- Trade and International
Ivan Osorio
Editorial Director
- Labor and Employment
Ryan Radia
Research Fellow and Regulatory Counsel
- Intellectual Property
- Media, Speech and Internet Freedoms
- Privacy and Cybersecurity
Fran Smith
Adjunct Fellow
- Trade and International
Fred L. Smith, Jr.
Founder; Chairman Emeritus
- Automobiles and Roads
- Aviation
- Business and Government
Ryan Young
Senior Fellow
- Business and Government
- Regulatory Reform