The Obama administration has been busy implementing what remains of its regulatory agenda, publishing more than 2,000 regulations last week alone, covering issues from nutrition labeling to energy standards for appliances.
Federal agencies finalized 70 new regulations in one week, adding to the already 1,344 final rules published in the Federal Register in 2016, according to the Competitive Enterprise Institute.
“That’s the equivalent of a new regulation every two hours and 24 minutes,” CEI’s Ryan Young wrote in a blog post. “Last week, 2,013 new pages were added to the Federal Register, after 2,065 pages the previous week.”
The Obama administration was working overtime to finish as many regulations as it could before May 23rd. Regulations finished before that deadline can’t be overturned if a Republican wins the presidency in November. Agencies were able to finish nearly 200 regulations before the deadline, according to Politico.
The American Action Forum estimates federal agencies have already finalized more than $100 billion worth of new regulations in 2016. Obama officials are on track to finalize 3,262 regulations this year, taking up nearly 83,000 pages in the Federal Register.
“This regulatory onslaught has only gotten worse in the administration’s final months,” complained Minnesota Republican Rep. John Kline told Politico.
Two of the costliest rules imposed last week had to do with food nutrition labels and the definition of serving sizes. The updates to food labelling are expected to cost $8.6 billion.
The Obama administration also issued new energy efficiency regulations for HVAC equipment, but it’s not clear how much this new regulation will cost the economy.
