Aiming to erase the “fuzzy math” past administrations used to hide the costs of politically favored policies, the Environmental Protection Agency is pulling back the curtain on costs and benefits, and planning to kill regulations that are out of whack.
“It hopefully will take away some of the fuzzy math that administrations have done in the past on justifying regulations,” said EPA Administrator Andrew R. Wheeler of his new policy.
And, he added, it will set a new bottom-line for all regulations in the rules heavy agency. “If the costs are too high we should change the regulatory approach. We shouldn’t be having regulations that cost more than the benefits they provide,” he said in an interview.
With the new rules will come unusual transparency and a pledge to make public the costs and benefits of regulations coming out of the environmental agency.
“It will provide more confidence in the regulatory process,” said Wheeler.
And, he added, “Hopefully there will be fewer people upset with EPA, upset with the federal government.”
The new effort in Wheeler’s policy memo, titled “Increasing Consistency and Transparency in Considering Benefits and Costs in the Rulemaking Process,” is aimed at opening the door to the secretive regulation process and ending suspicions that politics drives policy.
“I really do hope it depoliticizes it,” said Wheeler.
President Trump campaigned on a promise to cut two Obama-era regulations for every new one he proposes. The EPA has led that effort, cutting far more than 2-1 for a total savings to taxpayers of $3.6 billion, Wheeler said. Since Trump came into office, the EPA has cut 40 major regulations and plans to axe another 49, he said.
“We are definitely at the top” of regulation killers, he added.
The new memo to assistant administrators said that regulations on the Clean Air Act will come under scrutiny first.
While Wheeler’s actions may sound like common sense, many EPA laws only “contemplate the consideration of benefits and costs as part of the regulatory decision-making,” said his memo.
Now, he wrote, “the EPA should evaluate and consider both benefits and costs in decision-making.”
