The week in regulation

The post-election regulatory tide rolls on:

Rules are called “economically significant” if they have costs of $100 million or more in a given year. The 46 such rules published so far in 2012 have compliance costs of at least $24 billion. Two of the rules do not have cost estimates, and two other rules have cost estimates that do not give a total annual cost. We assume that rules lacking this basic transparency measure cost the bare minimum of $100 million per year. The true cost is almost certainly higher.

We twist our hankies over the economic effects of tax changes of this magnitude in either direction, but there is essentially no debate about the economic burden of regulation.