Regulators added $2.6 billion in costs this week, led by a final rule to enhance rail car standards. Annualized burdens were $239 million, which equaled annual benefits. Paperwork hours increased by more than 685,000.                     

Regulatory Toplines

• New Proposed Rules: 46
• New Final Rules: 65
• 2015 Significant Documents: 928
• 2015 Total Pages of Regulation: 26,816
• 2015 Proposed Rules: $24.7 Billion
• 2015 Final Rules: $42 Billion

AAF has catalogued regulations according to their codification in the Code of Federal Regulations (CFR). The CFR is organized into 50 titles, with each title corresponding to an industry or part of government. This snapshot will help to determine which sectors of the economy receive the highest number of regulatory actions.

The Department of Transportation finalized its rule to improve tank car standards for rail. The measure would regulate trains carrying flammable liquids and control their speed, braking systems, and routing. During the next twenty years, it would impose more than $2.4 billion in costs. On an annualized basis, costs eclipse $124 million, compared to $145 million for benefits.  

Affordable Care Act

The administration published a final rule to amend requirements for Part D prescribers. The interim final rule (meaning there was no proposal on which the public could comment) aims to increase access for Part D beneficiaries. Costs arise from increased notices, to the tune of $20 million annually, with 83,000 paperwork burden hours.  

Since passage, based on total lifetime costs of the regulations, the Affordable Care Act has imposed costs of $43.8 billion in state and private-sector burdens and 164.8 million annual paperwork hours.

Dodd-Frank

In what was a long streak of inactivity for notable Dodd-Frank regulation, the Securities and Exchange Commission proposed a rule to measure CEO pay versus company performance. The proposal now requires companies “to disclose in a clear manner the relationship between executive compensation actually paid and the financial performance of the registrant.” However, emerging companies and foreign issuers do not have to comply. Total burdens equal $9 million and 67,500 paperwork burden hours.

Click here to view the total estimated revised costs from Dodd-Frank; since passage, the legislation has produced more than 65.7 million paperwork burden hours and imposed $33.3 billion in direct compliance costs. Based on calculations from the Financial Services Roundtable, Dodd-Frank regulations would require 32,826 employees to file federal paperwork.

Total Burdens

Since January 1, the federal government has published $66.8 billion in compliance costs ($42.08 billion in final rules) and has imposed 23.2 million in net paperwork burden hours (5.76 million from final rules). Click below for the latest Reg Rodeo findings.