Today marks the release of the twentieth anniversary edition of Ten Thousand Commandments, Wayne Crews’ annual overview of the regulatory state. Over at the Daily Caller, Wayne and I briefly summarize of few of the report’s findings. Here’s a taste:
Since the first edition of Ten Thousand Commandments was published in 1993, a touch less than 1.43 million Federal Register pages have been published. That’s an average of 71,470 pages per year. Considering that an average year has 250 workdays (the Federal Register is not published on weekends or holidays), that roughly averages out to 286 pages per day. It takes a very busy federal government to fill that many pages each and every workday.
We also ran a few numbers and found something very interesting:
A standard ream of 20-pound weight paper, standard for office use, is about two inches thick. From that, we can calculate that our 1.43 million-page stack would be 476 feet tall. It would also weigh more than seven tons. Fittingly, this regulatory tower would rival the Washington Monument’s 555 feet for supremacy of Washington’s skyline. In fact, if the tower were to keep growing at its 20-year average pace, it would surpass the Washington Monument in 2016.
Read the whole thing here. And read the new Ten Thousand Commandments here.
By definition, if a bill is sponsored by Sens. Mark Udall, D-Colo., and Rand Paul, R-Ky., or any similarly odd ideological couples in the House, it more than meets the definition of bipartisan. For that, it should get a big kumbaya from the Beltway cognoscenti.
Yet the Udall-Paul bill, S. 968, should be cheered not just because of its bipartisanship, but because it actually spreads freedom. Those concerned with government eroding options for entrepreneurs should cheer this legislation, which lifts regulatory barriers to an untapped source of capital for startups: America’s credit unions.
Small business and startups pursue many diverse sources of funding. As traditional sources have dried up, many credit unions have stepped up to fill the void. As Rohit Arora, CEO of the Biz2Credit small business loan arranging service, recently explained at FoxBusiness.com, “Following the mortgage bust, many big banks essentially turned off the spigot to small business lending. Credit unions decided to take advantage of this hole in the marketplace by increasing their small business loan-making.”
But because of government barriers to credit union business lending, thousands of entrepreneurial ventures may be unnecessarily deprived of the seed capital credit unions could provide to them. As Arora says, “Credit unions are handcuffed by a lending cap of 12.25 percent of their assets imposed by the Credit Union Membership Access Act of 1998. Thus, many of those who became active in small business lending quickly hit their limit.”
And this regulatory barrier is exactly what Udall-Paul, and its House companion H.R. 688, sponsored by Rep. Ed Royce, R-Calif., would fix. The legislation would raise the cap for business lending to 27.5 percent of a credit union’s assets. The modest hike in the lending cap would pay big dividends for entrepreneurs and the economy. The Credit Union National Association estimates this increase in the cap would create 138,000 jobs in the first year, a figure Pepperdine University economist David M. Smith calls “conservative and well within the bounds of a reasonable projection.”
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When you sit down at a Mediterranean restaurant, your server will typically set down some bread on the table, then pour some olive oil into a saucer or small bowl for dipping. Many restaurants also keep small jugs of olive oil as part of their table setting for general use. It’s a delicious way to begin a meal.
New European Union regulations are set to change this centuries-long practice. Starting January 1, 2014, any olive oil served at table “must be in pre-packaged, factory bottles with a tamper-proof dispensing nozzle and labelling in line with tight EU standards.” That means no more saucers of oil for dipping, and no more refillable jugs at the table.
Most complaints about the rule have been directed at the EU’s micromanagerial tendencies, and there is certainly something to it. But there is also a public choice angle that’s worth looking at.
Many restaurants buy their olive oil from small family farms that aren’t able to comply with the new labeling and sealing standards. Restaurants buy from them because many diners prefer their olive oil to the more homogeneous product put out by larger firms. These larger firms are also precisely the people who will benefit from the new rules. A public choice theorist would point out that the big producers very likely had something to do with pushing for their passage, and their added business comes at the expense of smaller farms — and consumers’ palettes.
This kind of rent-seeking behavior is all too common. And the more regulations there are, the more rent-seeking one sees. These olive oil rules are only the latest example. Most supporters of the rule might be motivated by health and safety, but certain other supporters are more concerned with securing an artificial competitive advantage for themselves.
The The Wall Street Journal editorial board weighed in this morning on the issue of regulation, citing a few numbers from the forthcoming 20th anniversary edition of Wayne Crews’ annual Ten Thousand Commandments report. Here’s a taste:
For two decades, Wayne Crews of the Competitive Enterprise Institute has tracked the growth of new federal regulations. In his 20th anniversary edition this week, he’ll report that pages in the Code of Federal Regulations hit an all-time high of 174,545 in 2012, an increase of more than 21% during the last decade.
Relying largely on government data, Mr. Crews estimates that in 2012 the cost of federal rules exceeded $1.8 trillion, roughly equal to the GDP of Canada. These costs are embedded in nearly everything Americans buy. Mr. Crews calculates these costs at $14,768 per household, meaning that red tape is now the second largest item in the typical family budget after housing.
Read the whole thing here.
This week in the world of regulation:
- Last week, 71 new final regulations were published in the Federal Register. This is up from 64 new final rules the previous week.
- That’s the equivalent of a new regulation every two hours and 22 minutes — 24 hours a day, seven days a week.
- All in all, 1,298 final rules have been published in the Federal Register this year.
- If this keeps up, the total tally for 2013 will be 3,458 new final rules.
- Last week, 1,377 new pages were added to the 2013 Federal Register, for a total of 29,188 pages.
- At its current pace, the 2013 Federal Register will run 76,011 pages.
- Rules are called “economically significant” if they have costs of $100 million or more in a given year. For the fourth week in a row, no such rules were published last week, for a total of 12 so far in 2013.
- The total estimated compliance costs of this year’s economically significant regulations ranges from $5.58 billion to $10.19 billion.
- So far, 91 final rules that meet the broader definition of “significant” have been published in 2013.
- So far this year, 237 final rules affect small business; 21 of them are significant rules.
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- A new technology called a “wearable robot” – basically a pair of robotic legs – enables paralyzed people to walk. As Vice President Joe Biden might say, this is a big deal. It will be ready for the market in about a year. But the real obstacle may be regulators, who have yet to approve the device.
- Street musicians in St. Louis, Missouri must audition in front of city officials before they can perform in public. (via Jacob Grier)
- In Swaziland, witches may no longer fly broomsticks more than 150 meters above the ground. The regulation is enforced by the country’s civil avaiation authority. The penalty for violators is R500,000 (South African Rands), which is equivalent to a little more than $54,000. Swaziland’s per capita GDP is $3,831. Strangely, there is no penalty for witches whose broomstick-flying adventures remain under 150 meters.
- Legislators in California and elsewhere are mulling a ban on 3-D printed guns.
- San Francisco appears poised to drop its long-running push to require radiation warning labels on cell phones. More on why cell phone radiation scares are hokum here and here.
- A 10-year old UK schoolgirl was reprimanded by police for drawing a hopscotch grid on a sidewalk. The officers claimed she was causing “criminal damage,” but let her off with a warning.
- Alabama has legalized homebrewing. It is now legal in all 50 states.
- Cato’s Ilya Shapiro with some good analysis of a bill that would rein in abuses of the Clean Water Act.
News stories trumping junk science are common, but I expect better from Fox News, which claims to be “fair and balanced” and hosts great shows like STOSSEL. And they’ve run some of my commentaries, which I appreciate. That’s why I am perplexed by some Fox reports on environmental issues, many of which seem to peddle junk science pushed by activists at the Environmental Working Group (EWG).
For example, the other day Fox published a silly story from Prevention magazine on how chemicals found in popcorn cooked in nonstick pans might give you heart disease based on a single study that found a statistical association, which can occur by mere chance. How many other studies failed to find an association? The article doesn’t bother to go there—rather, it says: “Scary? You bet.” The article does offer a weak qualifier, stating that “more research needs to be done to determine the specific relationship between PFOA [the chemical used in non-stick the pans] and cardiovascular disease.”
Another recent Fox-published article highlights EWG’s latest Shoppers’ Guide to Pesticides in Produce. Fox offers no critical analysis of the activist groups’ crazy claims.
Yet EWG’s Shoppers’ Guide is a perversion of data that the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) collects annually to measure traces of pesticides found on produce. Residue levels are always extremely low, and USDA and the Environmental Protection Agency both explain that the data demonstrates that levels are too low to pose significant health risks. Yet EWG lists healthy foods—such as apples—as “dirty” because they have a few extra parts per billion of trace pesticide residues. The response should be: Who cares? The levels are too low to have an impact, and eating these foods is certainly good for your health.
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The state of Indiana regulates the temperature at which convenience stores may sell beer. Specifically, they must sell it at room temperature. Cold beer is forbidden. The law, unique to Indiana, is presumably motivated by temperance concerns. People can’t buy beer on the spur of the moment and it drink it cold right away. They have to take it home and refrigerate it first. Instead of instant gratification, people have to plan ahead. This promotes more responsible drinking habits, the thinking goes.
Then again, the law exempts wine sales. Any Indianan who wants to can buy a chilled bottle of wine from the local 7-11 and drink it immediately. Instead of keeping people sober, the law amounts in practice to discrimination against beer. Wine producers might not mind that so much, but nearly everyone else does.
Even so, a push to overturn the law in the legislature failed earlier this year. That’s why three convenience store chains are suing to overturn the law. The case is currently moving through federal court. An employee of one chain told WISH, a local television station:
“Thorton’s has not built a convenience store in Indiana since 2006,” said David Bridgers of Thorton’s convenience stores, “for the sole reason of its antiquated alcohol laws.”
So not only does Indiana’s warm beer law fail to promote temperance, it is directly hampering job creation in the state.
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Daily Beast blogger Justin Green, who blogs on columnist David Frum’s Daily Beast blog, has responded to Wired’s recent article “Biometric Database of All Adult Americans Hidden in Immigration Reform.” Green thinks that there is no reason for concern, writing that “fortunately, Wired’s assertion is false.” Unfortunately, he has been misled.
First, Green claims that biometric information is being collected, but “those affected are unauthorized aliens, not American citizens.” But this is incorrect. The E-Verify database will affect every single U.S. citizen who is a potential worker. Given the fact that the database will include photographs, it is biometric. Green responds by quoting an anonymous Senate aide telling him that photos aren’t “biometric” by any “reasonable definition.” This might just be semantics, but as identification expert Jim Harper notes in his book Identity Crisis:
Biometrics measures the distinct traits that people have on their bodies. Examples of physiological biometrics are all the things we think of most commonly as physical identifiers–hair color, eye color, sex, skin color, height, weight, and so on.
In other words, a picture contains a host of biometric information about you, not just one piece of biometric information. Is this an uncommon or “unreasonable” definition? Well, I think the standard for reasonable or common usage would be Wikipedia, which defines biometrics as “identifiers are the distinctive, measurable characteristics used to label and describe individuals.” Under this definition, photographs would also apply, and in an age of facial recognition software, it would certainly not be difficult to take a picture of an individual and use it to find them in such a database.
Never mind how experts or the general public use the word, the phrase biometric identification has a specific legal definition. Under 46 USC 70123, “the term “biometric identification” means use of fingerprint and digital photography images and facial and iris scan technology and any other technology considered applicable by the Department of Homeland Security.” In other words, the government itself defines photographs as biometric identification.
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Is your hand wash slowly killing you as government regulators sit idly by? Sounds silly, but that’s what environmentalists seem to think about an antibacterial agent called triclosan, which is used in soap and other consumer products.
According to the NRDC: “In laboratory studies, they [antibacterial chemicals] have been shown to disrupt hormones and can encourage the growth of drug-resistant bacteria or ‘superbugs.’” The group wants consumers to urge the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) “to pull products containing triclosan and triclocarban from store shelves.” The NRDC is also suing FDA for not completing its scientific review of triclosan, which has dragged on for more than 40 years.
The Globe and Mail reports: “Some Americans are shocked that the FDA has taken so long. Mallory Smith is troubled to learn that the government has never confirmed the safety of antibacterial soap’s key ingredient.”
Yet the fact that bureaucrats rarely move quickly isn’t shocking at all. In fact, the NRDC lawsuit proves why government isn’t well suited to take swift action or promote public safety. And there are many reasons why chemical reviews in particular take a long time, none of which have to do with safety.
First, chemical exposures from consumer products are generally too low to have any significant impacts. Measuring such negligible risks is akin to looking for needle in a field of haystacks. Government researchers can dig and dig, yet never find anything, nor can they prove a chemical is 100 percent safe since nothing is. So they continue with no end in sight.
For example, while triclosan has been used pretty widely for more than 60 years, there’s no hard evidence of triclosan-caused cancers or “superbugs.” The best greens can offer are allegations based on studies that suggest links between the chemical and health effects in rodents dosed large amounts. The same is true for naturally occurring chemicals in broccoli, coffee, pickles, and more. We don’t need an FDA review of these foods to know they are safe to eat and that these rodent studies are not particularly relevant to human health risks from trace chemicals.
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