Regulatory Policy

Regulatory safeguards play a vital role in protecting us from hazards and ensuring that companies that pollute, make unsafe products, and create workplace hazards bear the cost of cleaning up their messes and preventing injuries and deaths. Still, the regulatory system is far from perfect: Rules take too long to develop; enforcement is often feeble; and political pressure from regulated industries has led to weak safeguards.

These systemic problems are made all the more severe by the determination of the Trump administration to undercut sensible safeguards across virtually all aspects of federal regulation. Moreover, the President and his team have taken aim at the the process by which such safeguards are developed, aiming to take a system already slanted in favor of industry profit at the expense of health, safety and the environment, and make it even less protective. For example, where critics of the use of cost-benefit analysis see a system that understates the value of safeguards and overstates the cost of implementing them -- making it difficult to adopt needed protections -- the Trump administration seeks simply to ignore benefits of safeguards, pretending they do not exist. The result is a regulatory system that fails to enforce landmark laws like the Clean Air Act, Clean Water Act and more.

CPR exposes and opposes efforts by opponents of sensible safeguards to undermine the regulatory system, fighting back against knee-jerk opposition to environmental, health, and safety protections. Below, see what CPR Members Scholars and staff have had to say in reports, testimony, op-eds and more. Use the search box to narrow the list.

Letter to ACUS on bias toward industry on international regulatory cooperation

Letter to the Administrative Conference of the United States urging it to ensure greater balance in its continuing work on International Regulatory Cooperation. "In general, ACUS has elevated business and trade concerns over health, safety, and environmental protections throughout its research project on IRC...."

Type: Letters to Agencies (March 21, 2013)
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Author(s): Thomas McGarity, Rena Steinzor, Michael Patoka
Rena Steinzor's testimony before the House Committee on Small Business about the Office of Advocacy's role in regulation.

Rena Steinzor's March 14, 2013, testimony before the House Committee on Small Business, Subcommittee on Investigations, Oversight and Regulations, about the SBA Office of Advocacy's role in regulation.

Type: Legislative Testimony (March 14, 2013)
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Author(s): Rena Steinzor
Robert Glicksman's testimony before the House Judiciary Committee on regulatory policy and Congressional bills affecting it.

Robert Glicksman's February 28, 2013, testimony before the House Judiciary Committee's Subcommittee on Regulatory Reform, Commercial, and Antitrust Law, on regulatory policy and Congressional bills affecting it.

Type: Legislative Testimony (Feb. 28, 2013)
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Author(s): Robert Glicksman
President has authority to act on regulatory issues

President has authority to act on regulatory issues, op-ed by David Driesen

Type: Op-Eds (Jan. 28, 2013)
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Author(s): David Driesen
Protecting People & the Environment by the Stroke of a Presidential Pen: Seven New Executive Orders for President Obama's Second Term, CPR Issue Alert 1215
Type: Reports (Jan. 9, 2013)
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Author(s): Robert Glicksman, Amy Sinden, Rena Steinzor, Matt Shudtz, James Goodwin, Michael Patoka
Obama Should Sidestep Congress

Obama Should Sidestep Congress, op-ed by Rena Steinzor and Amy Sinden

Type: Op-Eds (Dec. 27, 2012)
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Author(s): Amy Sinden, Rena Steinzor

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