By some estimates the total freight for the U.S. federal regulatory burden is $3 trillion annually. That covers everything from the costs of the reams of paperwork employers fill out to satisfy bureaucrats who never read any of it to lost productivity and investment.

To those who make up the regulatory state, which includes not just federal bureaucrats but also attorneys, academics, scientists, researchers and actuaries to name but a few archetypes, the real costs of what they propose are ancillary concerns. The fact that their labors are being undertaken in the name of the people, of the consumer, of the children, at heart is enough to allow them to sleep peacefully.