[Vision2020] Reining In the Regulators

[Art Deco]

  [image: The New York Times] <http://www.nytimes.com/>

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July 5, 2013
Reining In the Regulators By THE EDITORIAL
BOARD<http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/opinion/editorialboard.html>

For all its rabid partisanship, Congress has shown time and again that it
is willing to come together to deregulate corporate America. The latest
example is a new bill in the Senate that would effectively end the
independence of independent regulatory agencies, including the Securities
and Exchange Commission, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, the
Consumer Product Safety Commission and the National Labor Relations Board.

Introduced by Republicans Rob Portman and Susan Collins and Democrat Mark
Warner, the measure, if enacted, would scotch any remaining hope for
putting the Dodd-Frank financial reform law fully into practice anytime
soon — if ever. In the long run, it would benefit powerful corporate
interests over investor protection, consumer health and safety and basic
fairness.

Unlike cabinet departments and executive agencies, independent agencies do
not report to the White House. They are overseen by Congress, which deemed
them independent to insulate them from pressure by the executive branch and
to keep them focused on their public missions.

The Senate bill, called the Independent Agency Regulatory Analysis Act of
2013 <http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/z?c113:S.1173:>, would require
such agencies to submit all significant draft rules to the White House for
review. The stated goal is to ensure that new rules appropriately balance
costs and benefits. In reality, White House review, first established in
1980 to vet draft regulations from executive agencies, has long proved to
be an obstacle to timely and strong regulation.

The review process often adds lengthy delays to already arduous rule-making
procedures, in large part because corporations use it as an opportunity to
lobby for favorable treatment. It is opaque and also politicized, as shown
most recently by the Obama administration in 2012, when it delayed
important rules in an attempt to coddle industry and avoid Republican
criticism in an election year, creating a regulatory backlog that persists
to this day.

Subjecting independent agencies to executive regulatory review would not
improve the rule-making process, but it would ensure that ostensibly
regulated industries are as unregulated and deregulated as possible.

Even the bill’s Senate proponents admit as much, though not intentionally.
In June, Mr. Portman posted a supportive letter on his Web
site<http://www.portman.senate.gov/public/index.cfm/files/serve?File_id=8eb0dbd9-5631-4878-bfb2-e040407cf0ba>from
10 “current and former” top officials of independent regulatory
agencies. Several of the signatories are now lobbyists or lawyers for
corporate clients that are regulated by the independent agencies. The only
signatory who is a current official is Nancy Nord, a Bush appointee to the
Consumer Product Safety Commission, who has been a defender of industry and
is set to leave the office in October.

There is no question that making independent agencies less independent is a
bad idea. The question is whether Congressional Democrats and
administration officials will join forces to kill the measure.


-- 
Art Deco (Wayne A. Fox)
art.deco.studios at gmail.com
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