Remember this?
Obama has been quick to blame quakes and tsunamis for the disastrous economy. But according to a new report by the House Oversight Committee, Obama generated the most damaging tsunami himself.
The report says the Obama administration has “imposed 75 new major regulations costing more than $380 billion over ten years.” In addition, the report says there are 219 more “economically significant regulations” in the works which will cost businesses $100 million or more each year — for a minimum cost of $21 billion over ten years. The number of pages in the Federal Register, in which such rules are recorded, is increasing rapidly, the report says, and “pages devoted to final rules rose by 20 percent between 2009 and 2010, and proposed rules have increased from 2,044 in 2009 to 2,439 in 2010.”
“The Obama administration has created a regulatory environment that is suffocating America’s entrepreneurs’ ability to create jobs and grow business,” writes committee chairman Rep. Darrell Issa, Republican from California. “The result has been a regulatory tsunami that has stifled productivity, wages, job creation and economic growth.”
Among the examples listed in the committee report are so-called “sue and settle” agreements in which regulatory agencies work with activist groups to impose new burdens on businesses. The report focuses on the Environmental Protection Agency’s Lead Renovation, Repair and Painting Rule, which was designed to limit exposure to lead-based paints in houses built before 1978. Imposed in 2008 — before the Obama administration came to power — the rule required that renovations to older homes be done by EPA-certified contractors following EPA-dictated procedures. But the rule contained an opt-out provision: If a homeowner filed a certificate saying there were no pregnant women or children under six years of age in the home, the renovations could go forward without the certification. But that changed under when the Obama administration came to Washington. Several environmental groups challenged the opt-out provision, and the Obama EPA chose not to defend it, working with environmentalists in 2009 to fashion a settlement removing the opt-out provision. Now, all homeowners who renovate are required to go through the costly procedures.
That’s just scratching the surface, read the whole thing. This administration is dropping a wave of 4,256* new regulations on the economy this year alone. That includes one, the EPA’s cross-state pollution rule, that may cost $90 billion per year.
*Obama showily killed one EPA regulation a week or so back.
Do people truly understand how these regs stifle business startups, growth and hiring? While many PJM readers probably get it, I’m sure others don’t.
The Lead Renovation rule is a good example, one most readers could understand and relate to.
You and PJM have an opportunity here to take that one rule and “follow the money” through the process to demonstrate the added costs, redtape, time, complexities and frustrations just one rule creates for a critical, hard-hit industry.
The scary thing is that most of this hasn’t hit yet.
While I really want the economy to revive quickly and put a lot more people back to work, the sad fact is that it may be better in the short term for Obama to impose his “jobs plan” by executive order, so that, with all those regs and coal-fired plant closings and green tech scandals, and the jobs plan, the resulting Depression will all be on him.
York’s reporting is based on both press release and interview re the report. So I can’t tell whether the “costs” of regulations means the direct, increased costs of complying with the regulations or whether it also includes the knock-on opportunity costs. My guess is the former only. The foregone business start-ups & expansions, the otherwise profitable businesses rendered unprofitable and insolvent, whole industry sectors forfeited to a few big players and little innovation or capital investment, the lost jobs and the lost productivity are probably not counted. And the loss of relative value for every one of those unrenovated pre-1978 homes and similar burdened assets. And those costs may be too speculative, but they’re very real.
Sounds to me this is a way to hire more government control. Make everyone have to go through government regs to get anything done. Even on the smallest level. This will be cost effective and mind boggling just to paint a room in your house. We also have the food police. I can only wonder what is next?