The re-regulation president

ALTHOUGH the ninety-day moratorium has been extended indefinitely, expensive regulations continue unabated. In July, for example, a House committee passed a bill requiring that all cans, jars, bottles, and other containers used in the food industry be recyclable. The Resource Conservation and Recovery Act (RCRA) would cost consumers some $30 billion a year to rectify a problem that, even the EPA admits, "presents relatively low environmental risks."

Even without RCRA George Bush will, in four years, have undone the Reagan Administration's eight-year effort to reduce government regulations:

After falling by 17,000 during the Reagan years, the number of federal employees devoted to issuing and enforcing regulations will hit an all-time high of 124,994 this year. Under Bush the cost of administering federal regulatory programs has risen 18 per cent, in constant dollars. An additional 14,000 pages of the Federal Register are required just to list the rules and regulations added since George Bush's inauguration.

More importantly, the total cost of federal regulations, including the indirect costs borne by business and consumers, is between $430 billion and $562 billion, according to the latest Federal Budget. By comparison, income-tax revenues in fiscal 1991 totaled $468 billion.

Part of the blame rests with particular individuals. EPA Administrator William Reilly, for example, expanded the scope of the "wetlands" designation within days of assuming his position. A Heritage Foundation study reports that land under water for as little as seven days a year, as well as land that is dry at the surface but moist 18 inches down, is subject to federal control, preventing many farmers from planting their own land.

Similarly, Bush appointees at the Department of Justice and the Federal Trade Commission are pursuing far more activist agendas in areas such as civil rights and anti-trust than their Reaganera counterparts.

Most new regulations were mandated by laws passed during the past few years. The 1990 Clean Air Act will eventually add $25 to $35 billion to the $100 billion that business already spends on pollution controls, according to Murray Weidenbaum. Another 1990 law, the Americans with Disabilities Act, requires businesses, landlords, and public transportation to make their premises accessible to disabled individuals. Robert Genetski, an economic consultant, estimates that the physical modifications required at office buildings and hospitals alone will cost $65 billion. Economic regulations, including international trade barriers, farm price supports, the remaining regulation of airline travel, and the (recently raised) minimum wage, cost as much as $256 billion each year, in the form of lower output due to the regulations, plus the redistribution of wealth from those harmed by regulations to those who are made richer because of them.

Most regulations either do not achieve the results claimed by their supporters, or have unintended (negative) consequences. Occupational Safety and Health Administration regulations, for example, have not lowered accident or illness rates in the workforce, according to most studies. The law requiring that all auto manufacturers meet a federal fuel-economy standard (27.5 mpg in 1991) has forced auto manufacturers to make lighter cars, thereby increasing automobile fatalities by 2,200 and 3,900 per year. When regulations do save lives, they do so at exorbitant cost: as much as $5.7 trillion per premature death for certain Consumer Product Safety regulations.

With pro-growth tax legislation held hostage to election-year politics, regulatory relief may be the economy's only hope.

REGULATIONS AND REGULATORS

Cost of Administering Federal Regulations Regulatory Pages in the (Billions of 19875) Employees Federal Register

1970    $ 2.322        69,946       20,036
1980    8.780          121,708      87,012
1988    9.558          104,360      53,376
1992    11.276         124,994      67,716

COPYRIGHT 1992 National Review, Inc.
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