New regulations introduced last week by the Obama administration will cost U.S. businesses and consumers more than $5.3 billion in regulatory costs, along with 7.7 million paperwork burden hours, according to a new report from the conservative American Action Forum (AAF), reported The Daily Caller.
The burdens are largely due to the Food and Drug Administration's finalization of two safety rules for animal and human food consumption, which cost $4.7 billion, and burden businesses with more than 7.4 million paperwork hours. To justify the costs, incidents of foodborne illnesses would need to be reduced by 157,000, according to AAF.
The other regulation, a new Environmental Protection Agency methane rule for hydraulic fracturing, aka fracking, contains burdens to the tune of $420 million and more than 92,000 hours in paperwork.
"This proposal is part of a broader $2.6 billion imposition on oil and natural gas facilities, despite their promise for clean and affordable energy," said AAF, noting that the rule comes even though methane emissions have fallen by 38 percent since 2005, while at the same time, natural gas production has increased by 26 percent.
Last week's regulatory burdens are lower than the preceding week, which carried a $14 billion price tag, however, the total costs are quickly adding up, according to AAF's Director of Regulatory Policy Sam Batkins.
"Since January 1, the federal government has published $156 billion in compliance costs ($67.77 billion in final rules) and has imposed 70.5 million in net paperwork burden hours (22.68 million from final rules)," Batkins wrote.
A total of 52 new rules have been proposed and 77 finalized in 2015, with the per capita regulatory burden for 2015 being $486.
AAF also notes a Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) proposal to amend its Security-Based Swap Data Repositories adds some $100 million in costs and 36,000 paperwork burden hours.
As for one of the most controversial laws enacted by President Obama - the Affordable Care Act - it has imposed $47.9 billion in state and private-sector burdens, along with 165.9 million annual paperwork hours.
