Another week brought another opportunity for regulators to impose more than one billion dollars in burdens. For the third straight week, regulators obliged the American public. Regulatory burdens accelerated by $1 billion, with $71 million in annual burdens, and $60 million in benefits. Regulators proposed more than 400,000 new paperwork hours. The per capita regulatory burden for 2015 is $489.

Regulatory Toplines

• New Proposed Rules: 34
• New Final Rules: 84
• 2015 Total Pages of Regulation: 58,194
• 2015 Proposed Rules: $88.3 Billion
• 2015 Final Rules: $68.8 Billion

The American Action Forum (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 Energy (DOE) led the week with a final rule to improve efficiency standards for vertical air conditioners. For DOE rulemakings, the costs are somewhat modest, at just $20 million annually, and $43 million in benefits. However, the net present value burden eclipses $1 billion. The agency does estimate conversion costs per manufacturer of $1 million or roughly eight percent of annual revenue.

EPA proposed a pair of rules to regulate hazardous waste from generators and pharmaceuticals. Combined, they’ll impose slightly more than $30 million in annual burdens. Perhaps more surprisingly, the annual benefits are only $17 million. In other words, these proposals could cost the nation more than they deliver in benefits by almost a 2:1 ratio. In addition, the rulemakings impose more than 350,000 paperwork burden hours.

Affordable Care Act

Since passage, based on total lifetime costs of the regulations, the Affordable Care Act has imposed costs of $47.9 billion in state and private-sector burdens and 165.9 million annual paperwork hours.

Dodd-Frank

The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) finalized a rule requiring diversification for money markets. The measure imposes minor burdens: $1.6 million in total costs and 1,018 paperwork burden hours. The rule’s history actually dates to 2011.

Click here to view the total estimated revised costs from Dodd-Frank; since passage, the legislation has produced more than 67.3 million paperwork burden hours and imposed $35.1 billion in direct compliance costs.

Total Burdens

Since January 1, the federal government has published $157.1 billion in compliance costs ($68.8 billion in final rules) and has imposed 70.9 million in net paperwork burden hours (22.7 million from final rules). Click below for the latest Reg Rodeo findings.