Republicans claim to make rulemaking more efficient, but the RFA would expand the number of rules covered by the RFA and require agencies to perform excessive analysis of regulations that affect or indirectly affect small businesses.
This would raise government spending by entailing more federal agencies to use panels of experts to evaluate regulations and to prepare reports on the economic impact of proposed regulations on small businesses.
Republicans claim that this bill would promote job creation, but there is no correlation between regulations and job creation.
The RFA would require agencies to publicly report on the cumulative economic impact of any new regulations on the costs of existing regulations to small businesses without any mention of public interest or environmental impact.
Republicans call for government transparency, but the RFA would provide new authorities to the Small Business Administration (SBA’s) Office of Advocacy to intervene in agency rulemaking.
H.R. 2542 empowers the Chief Counsel for Advocacy to unilaterally issue regulations about how agencies in general should comply with the Act. Federal agencies are charged with promulgating regulations that impact food and safety.
Section 5 of H.R. 2542 repeals the authority under current law that allows an agency to waive or delay the initial analyses required under the Regulatory Flexibility Act “in response to an emergency that makes compliance or timely compliance…impracticable.”
Section 6 of H.R. 2542 would require agencies to review not only all the rules currently in effect, but, in addition, all guidance documents in effect as of the bill’s date of enactment.
H.R. 2542 mandates that agencies prepare excessively detailed analyses for proposed rules and requires review panels to ensure that certain rules issued by all agencies consider the interests of small businesses. There is no mention of an analysis of public interest or benefit of the regulation.
Republicans claim to try to get rid of government waste and excessive spending, but the CBO estimates that implementing an almost exact copy of the bill, which was introduced last Congress, would cost $80 million over a five-year period, assuming appropriation of the necessary funds.
Republicans claim to have the public interest at heart, but H.R. 2542 target agencies that issue the most major rules with an estimated economic impact on the economy of more than $100 million per year, which include the Department of Health and Human Services, the U.S. Department of Agriculture, and EPA.
