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Showing 913 results

Rena Steinzor | August 1, 2012

The Independent Agency Regulatory Analysis Act, as Critiqued by Co-Sponsor Susan Collins and Me

Talk about trying to fix the wrong problem: Senators Mark Warner, Rob Portman, and Susan Collins have introduced a bill today that seeks to move the rulemaking process further away from agency experts and transparency and more toward hidden corners of the White House, where well-heeled industries can buy access and push political operatives to […]

Ben Somberg | July 18, 2012

White House Now Not Sure it is Interested at All in Public’s Ideas for Strengthening Existing Rules

The White House’s message on its program for retrospectively reviewing existing regulations just shifted a little further away from recognizing the need for protective regulations for health, safety, and the environment. First the White House said it was interested in “expanding” certain existing regulations, if appropriate. Then it said it was interested in hearing ideas […]

Lee Ewing | July 12, 2012

D.C. Circuit Rejects Developers’ Claim that EPA Must Form Small Business Panel

In a case that could have far reaching implications for agencies subject to the Regulatory Flexibility Act, the D.C. Circuit Court last month held that an EPA decision not to convene a small business advocacy review panel before issuing a rule was not judicially reviewable.  The decision by Judge Merrick Garland, for a unanimous 3-judge […]

Daniel Farber | July 9, 2012

The Romney Website’s Circular Blame Game

Cross-posted from Legal Planet. The Romney website portrays regulation as a huge drag on the economy. But it can’t decide who’s to blame. Is it all Obama’s fault? Or not just Obama, but a whole succession of Presidents, many of them presumably Republicans? Or is it bureaucrats who have overpowered all of these Presidents? The […]

Matthew Freeman | July 3, 2012

Columbia Journalism Review Calls Out Bloomberg Story on Regulation

Last week, The Washington Post ran a story about regulation, headlined, “Regulators surge in numbers while overseers shrink.” The story came from Bloomberg and was written by reporter Andrew Zajac. The headline captures the thrust of the piece. Zajac writes: As the U.S. government’s regulatory bureaucracy has ballooned, one agency has been left behind: the […]

Lisa Heinzerling | June 14, 2012

Cost-Benefit Jumps the Shark: The Department of Justice’s Economic Analysis of Prison Rape

Cross-posted from Georgetown Law Faculty Blog. Despite initial signs suggesting a different path, the Obama Administration has promoted the role of cost-benefit analysis in regulatory policy as fiercely as any administration before it. Nothing demonstrates this more clearly, I think, than the Administration’s bizarre and unfortunate decision to apply cost-benefit analysis to measures to limit […]

James Goodwin | May 30, 2012

Spurred on by Industry, OIRA Weakens Rule to Prevent Fatigue-Related Aviation Catastrophes

Last December, the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) finalized a new aviation safety rule designed to prevent excessive pilot fatigue, a problem that had contributed to at least one high-profile airline disaster—the Colgan Air Flight 3407 crash near Buffalo, New York, in February of 2009, which killed 50 and injured four—as well as to a disturbing […]

Robert Verchick | May 21, 2012

Test Questions I Wish I’d Asked

The end of the school year always leaves me wishing that I could have lectured more clearly or somehow covered more in my classes on environmental law and policy. There was really just too much to discuss. How does one do justice to all those doubtful arguments in support of the Keystone XL pipeline? It’s […]

Rena Steinzor | May 10, 2012

New Executive Order Skewed Toward Placating Regulated Industries: Obama Administration Continues Retreat from Protection of Public Health, Worker and Consumer Safety, and the Environment

President Obama issued the latest salvo in the Administration’s efforts to placate the business community this morning, in the form of a new Executive Order called “Identifying and Reducing Regulatory Burdens.”   The Order would expand and enhance the unfunded mandate that would require agencies to scour through the rule books, finding “excessive” rules that would […]