A record-setting series of regulations issued by the outgoing Obama administration in 2016 will cost the economy nearly $2 trillion a year, but President Trump has vowed to boost the economy by cutting these regulations.
The total number of pages in the Federal Register surged nearly 20% in 2016 to nearly 96,000 the most ever, while the number of final rules, nearly 4000, was the most since 2005, according to a report from the Competitive Enterprise Institute, a free-market think tank.
The report indicated the new regulations will cost the economy nearly $2 trillion per year.
Under the Obama administration, federal agencies issued 685 major rules, which are defined as those having an economic impact of at least $100 million, compared to 505 during the Bush administration.
The Department of the Treasury, which administers the Internal Revenue Service (IRS), accounted for nearly 500 major rules, followed by the Interior, Transportation and Commerce departments, along with the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA).
“The federal government’s reach extends far beyond its taxes, deficits, and borrowing. Federal environmental, safety and health, and economic regulations affect the economy by hundreds of billions — even trillions — of dollars annually,” wrote Clyde Wayne Crews Jr.
In addition to the costs inflicted directly on the economy, other academic studies indicated federal agencies spent $63 billion in fiscal year 2016 to administer the massive federal regulatory bureaucracy.
President Donald Trump has vowed to roll back the administrative bureaucracy, ordering EPA Director Scott Pruitt to review the Obama administration’s Clean Power Plan and working with Congress to repeal Obama-era coal regulations under the Congressional Review Act.
In addition, Trump has indicated plans to withdraw from the job-killing Paris Climate Deal.
Trump’s pending decision to withdraw from the globalist-backed deal has sparked opposition from Congressional Democrats, with House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi calling it “a stunning abdication of American leadership and a grave threat to our planet’s future.”
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