Regulatory reform is a broad and all-encompassing policy goal of the Competitive Enterprise Institute. It is essential for entrepreneurship, innovation, and prosperity to flourish. We advocate for reform by surveying the size, scope, and cost of federal regulations. We show how they affect the U.S. economy at large and making proposals to policy makers to enact reforms.

There are two main areas in which Congress can enact meaningful reform. The first is to rein in regulatory guidance documents, which we refer to as “regulatory dark matter,” whereby agencies regulate through Federal Register notices, guidance documents, and other means outside standard rulemaking procedure. The second is to enact a series of reforms to increase agency transparency and accountability of all regulation and guidance. These include annual regulatory report cards for rulemaking agencies and regulatory cost estimates from the Office of Management and Budget for more than just a small subset of rules.

​In 2019, President Trump signed two executive orders aimed at stopping the practice of agencies using guidance documents to effectively implement policy without going through the legally required notice and comment process.

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News Release

SEC Drops the Ball on Sarbanes-Oxley

Contact: Richard Morrison, 202.331.2273 Washington, D.C., December 13, 2006—The Competitive Enterprise Institute today criticized the Securities and Exchange Commission for failing to provide meaningful…

Antitrust

Op-Eds

Freedom Fighter

The war to advance economic liberty will last forever. The effort is frustrating and often discouraging. Many freedom fighters burn out, retire from the field,…

Antitrust

Op-Eds

Friedman’s Legacy

Though I never met him, Milton Friedman, who has died aged 94, was one of the earliest influences on my political development. In…

Antitrust

Op-Eds

The Unboring Pundit

<?xml:namespace prefix = o ns = “urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office” />   John Tierney's Tuesday column began innocently enough. He…

Antitrust

Op-Eds

Petronoia

As the price of oil and gas rose to 1970s oil crisis levels over the past year, pundits flew out of the woodwork…

Antitrust

Op-Eds

Credit card ricochet

“Partners in plunder.” That's how an intriguing new book describes the hidden relationship between big government and big business. <?xml:namespace prefix = o…

Antitrust

Op-Eds

Schumer’s Way

Senator Schumer is on a roll. After coasting to an easy and well funded re-election in 2004, the senior senator from New York is…

Antitrust

Op-Eds

Volatile Gases

The European emissions trading scheme (ETS) was launched with great fanfare last year. The idea was to require certain energy-intensive industries to have a…

Antitrust

Products

Animal Rights, Human Wrongs

Animal rights extremists—whom the FBI has labeled America’s biggest domestic terrorism threat—have encountered a number of serious reverses recently. These reverses are a great victory…

Antitrust

Op-Eds

Sunset the FCC

Reforming telecommunications law is a favored subject in the halls of Congress this year. Hot issues include streamlining video franchising and addressing the "net…

Antitrust

Staff & Scholars

Clyde Wayne Crews

Fred L. Smith Fellow in Regulatory Studies

  • Business and Government
  • Consumer Freedom
  • Deregulation

Ryan Young

Senior Economist and Director of Publications

  • Antitrust
  • Business and Government
  • Regulatory Reform

Fred L. Smith, Jr.

Founder; Chairman Emeritus

  • Automobiles and Roads
  • Aviation
  • Business and Government

Sam Kazman

Counsel Emeritus

  • Antitrust
  • Automobiles and Roads
  • Banking and Finance

Marlo Lewis, Jr.

Senior Fellow

  • Climate
  • Energy
  • Energy and Environment