The federal government promulgates thousands of regulations each year, at a cost to businesses and consumers that some have estimated at more than $1.75 trillion.

In order to make sense of the dizzying maze of new rules, the American Action Forum will tabulate and track major regulations emerging from more than 500 federal agencies.

This inaugural edition recorded $138.7 million in costs and regulatory burdens alone.  These are figures compiled from the individual agencies and likely do not include the broader macroeconomic affects of complying with the regulation.  In total, the federal government promulgated 56 final rules, 79 proposed rules, of which 12 were considered significant.  These regulations consumed 1,230 pages in the Federal Register.  

One of most expensive items this week was promulgated by the Federal Aviation Administration.  The agency determined that required installation of new equipment on Boeing planes would cost the airline industry $27.7 million.

In addition, the EPA published a final rule on emission standards for internal combustion engines (without a cost estimate), and five new Dodd-Frank regulations were proposed by three separate agencies; however, only the SEC provided a cost estimate for implementation, $226,000.

For the year, the total cost of 174 proposed or enact regulations is more than $17 billion.  Click here for our spreadsheet of the major regulations promulgated in 2011.