Yesterday, the US President has signed a new Executive Order on “Identifying and Reducing Regulatory Burdens” making it a continuing obligation of government to scrutinize rules on the books to see if they really make sense. The Order directs agencies to seek public comments on rules in need of review. To promote priority-setting, the Order directs agencies to emphasize reforms that produce significant quantifiable savings. To promote accountability, the Order requires agencies to provide the public with regular reports on their past efforts and their future plans -- with details and deadlines. These new instructions build on, and institutionalize, the President’s Executive Order of January 18, 2011, which first called for retrospective review of rules on the books (the regulatory “lookback”). In parallel, the Council of Economic Advisers is issuing a report on the “lookback.” The report outlines the progress made to date. It notes that agencies have identified over 500 reforms and that a small fraction of them, already finalized or formally proposed to the public, will be saving more than $10 billion over the next five years. The report emphasizes that we need continued analysis and public participation to identify rules that should be streamlined, improved, or eliminated. See also Cass Sunstein’s analysis of the package (tip from Daniel T.)
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