New American:

Regulators R Us: Feds Crank Up Regulations — on Everything

Get set for the Obama administration’s post-election tsunami of business-killing, job-killing, economy-killing federal regulations. It’s already begun. Take a look at www.regulations.gov, the administration’s regulatory website. The home page informs us that in the last 90 days, the administration has posted 5,934 new regulations.

Yes, our federal bureaucrats have been very diligent. The above-mentioned website informs us of their daily productivity of regulations over the past 90 days:

Today (121)
Last 3 Days (274)
Last 7 Days (371)
Last 15 Days (826)
Last 30 Days (1,915)
Last 90 Days (5,934)

How will these regulations affect you, your family, your job, business, ranch, or farm? You may not have federal SWAT teams descend upon you, as has happened to dairy farmers and natural food store operators who dared to sell raw milk products not approved by the federal Food & Drug Administration (see here and here) or the hundreds of other Americans subjected to Gestapo-type treatment for running afoul of the volumes of murky and convoluted regulations that fill the 169,301 pages of the Code of Federal Regulations (CFR) published in the Federal Register. However, even if your home, farm or business is not personally “visited” by agents of the FDA, EPA, OSHA, SEC, or any of the myriad other federal agencies, you will pay a huge price nonetheless, both in economic costs and in loss of freedoms.

A cost analysis by the Small Business Administration in 2008 found that the cost to our national economy of compliance with federal regulations was an astronomical $1.75 trillion!

That was in 2008. The cost, of course, has escalated dramatically in the four years since that study was conducted. We should note also that the 169,301 pages of federal regulations referenced above covers only those promulgated through 2011; it does not include thousands of pages added in 2012. Nor does it include the thousands of pages that are expected to soon be dumped into the pipeline by bureaucrats who had been instructed to hold off until after the election.

According to the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, between Jan. 1, 2009 and Dec. 31, 2011 the Code of Federal Regulations increased by 11,327 pages — a 7.4-percent increase. The regulatory burden is now a crushing weight on the entire economy, a hidden tax which is equivalent to roughly half the current federal spending and equal to the entire federal budget of the late 1990s.

A study by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce entitled Project No Project found that a broad range of energy projects “are being stalled, stopped, or outright killed nationwide due to a broken permitting process and a system that allows nearly limitless opportunities for opponents of development to raise challenge after challenge.”

The impact has been truly mind-boggling. The Chamber of Commerce study reported:

In total, the 351 projects identified in the Project No Project inventory could have produced a $1.1-trillion boost to the economy and created 1.9 million jobs annually during the projected seven years of construction. Moreover, these facilities, once constructed, would have continued to generate jobs, because they would have operated for years or even decades.

That’s nearly two million jobs annually, just in the energy sector, that are being killed by the federal regulatory straitjacket.

In an op-ed in the Washington Post on November 13, attorney Keith A. Ashmus noted that the regulatory cliff rivals the fiscal cliff among small business owners’ biggest concerns. And it is almost certain to get worse, if Team Obama has its way.

“Following President Obama’s reelection and the continuation of the current majorities in the House and Senate, we can expect continued difficulty moving initiatives forward legislatively in Washington,” noted Mr. Ashmus. “That means more regulatory activity, unrestrained by the any concerns about the president’s reelection. The Department of Labor, the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission and the National Labor Relations Board are likely to go after employers, large and small, with regulations that make it more difficult to manage workforces and obtain outside help understanding the legal requirements concerning unions.”

Obama Regulatory Plan: Sly, Not Shy

Not that President Obama has been shy about using executive branch regulations to get the Big Government programs he has been unable to get passed legislatively. In fact, following the 2010 congressional elections, in which the Democrats suffered historic losses in the House of Representatives, the Obama White House indicated it was going to move ahead with its agenda by executive fiat. The New American reported on this unconstitutional regulatory usurpation plan at the time. (See Obama Eyes "Executive Orders" to Circumvent Congress.)

However, with the economy imploding, unemployment skyrocketing, and with eyes fixed firmly on the 2012 presidential election, President Obama began a major effort, in 2011, to make it appear he was sensitive to the needs of job producers, especially stressing his administration’s commitment to easing the regulatory red tape that is so fatal to small and medium businesses that create most of our jobs.

Amid great fanfare, on January 18, 2011, President Obama signed “Executive Order 13563 — Improving Regulation and Regulatory Review.”

If words signified genuine intent, then there would be cause for rejoicing. The executive order stated, inter alia:

Our regulatory system must protect public health, welfare, safety, and our environment while promoting economic growth, innovation, competitiveness, and job creation. It must be based on the best available science. It must promote predictability and reduce uncertainty. It must identify and use the best, most innovative, and least burdensome tools for achieving regulatory ends. It must take into account benefits and costs, both quantitative and qualitative. It must ensure that regulations are accessible, consistent, written in plain language, and easy to understand. It must measure, and seek to improve, the actual results of regulatory requirements.

That was balm to the ears of struggling producers. Six months later, on June 13, President Obama launched follow-up public relations effort, signing “Executive Order 13576 — Delivering an Efficient, Effective, and Accountable Government.”

President Obama and members of his Cabinet made repeated ovations about the importance of small businesses and reducing the burden of regulation. Even Secretary of State Hillary Clinton got on the bandwagon. In a speech to Arab leaders in New York on September 28, she sang the praises of deregulation as the solution to economic stagnation in the Middle East:

On the economic front, we are zeroing in on small and medium-sized enterprises because they are the growth engines in any economy. They create the bulk of new jobs and they spread wealth more broadly through more communities….

So the OECD is helping emerging democracies find ways they can loosen regulations and make it easier to start or expand a small business.

Regulation reform figures prominently on the White House’s 21st Century Government: Campaign to Cut Waste website. It is also a major feature of the White House’s Open Government Initiative, which says it’s all about “Transparency, Collaboration, Participation.”

To this end, President Obama issued a “Memorandum for the Heads of Executive Departments and Agencies.” It is entitled: “Transparency and Open Government.” The opening paragraph reads:

My Administration is committed to creating an unprecedented level of openness in Government. We will work together to ensure the public trust and establish a system of transparency, public participation, and collaboration. Openness will strengthen our democracy and promote efficiency and effectiveness in Government.

Where’s the Transparency?

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