Death by regulations...

Government’s ‘Ten Thousand Commandments’ are killing the economy

by Sam Rolley

A new analysis from the Competitive Enterprise Institute reveals that the U.S. economy was subjected to nearly $2 trillion worth of lost productivity and price increases in 2014 as a result of burdensome federal regulations.

In “Ten Thousand Commandments: An Annual Snapshot of the Federal Regulatory State,” CEI Vice President for Policy Clyde Crews outlines how federal regulation cost the economy as a whole $1.88 trillion in 2015.

The cost of regulation is often hard to recognize for the average American consumer, but the CEI report says that it is a major burden on U.S. households.

From the institute: “Economy-wide regulatory costs amount to an average of $14,976 per household — around 29 percent of an average family budget of $51,100. Although not paid directly by individuals, this ‘cost’ of regulation exceeds the amount an average family spends on health care, food and transportation.”

Despite widespread public distaste for high taxes and the IRS, regulatory compliance costs are a far bigger burden exceeding “what the IRS is expected to collect in both individual and corporate income taxes for last year — by more than $160 billion.”

With an “Unconstitutionality Index,” Crews’ report also reveals that bureaucrats are creating far more costly edicts than Congress is passing laws.

“In 2014, agencies issued 16 new regulations for every law — that’s 3,554 new regulations compared to 224 new laws,” according to the report.

The Departments of the Treasury, Commerce, Interior, Health and Human Services and Transportation and the Environmental Protection Agency were responsible for nearly half (48 percent) of all new regulations in 2014. At present, a collection of 60 federal departments, agencies and commissions have 3,415 regulations in development “at various stages in the pipeline.”

At 77,687 pages, the 2014 Federal Register is the sixth largest in U.S. history.

From CEI: “Among the six all-time-high Federal Register total page counts, five occurred under President Obama.

“The George W. Bush administra­tion averaged 62 major regulations annually over eight years, while the Obama administration has averaged 81 major regulations annually over six years.”

Read the rest here:
http://personalliberty.com/governments-ten-thousand-commandments-killing-economy/