14 Jan 2010

Paperwork Reduction Act
How to improve implementation of the law

by Richard Belzer

in Paperwork Burdens

On October 28, 2009, the Office of Management and Budget solicited comments on its implementation of the Paperwork Reduction Act. The purpose of the PRA is to minimize burdens on the public resulting from the federal government's information requests.

Neutral Source managing editor Richard Belzer submitted comments on his own behalf. These comments eventually will be uploaded by OMB to Regulations.Gov, the Federal government's web portal for all regulatory matters. (Clicking on the link above will reveal a fundamental weakness of the web portal: Unless the agency chooses to include information identifying the name and organizational affiliation of the submitter, there is no way to find any specific comment without opening them all.)

In response to numerous requests, a copy of these comment is posted to the Library.

5 Jul 2009

"Mission Creep" at TSA:
The perils of discretionary authority

by Richard Belzer

in Litigation, Regulatory Policy

Wall Street Journal aviation columnist Scott McCartney reports that the Transportation Security Administration's recent efforts to expand its domain into general law enforcement has encountered legal obstacles. More...

25 Feb 2009

Regulatory Review in the Obama Administration, Part 3:
Cass Sunstein and his critics

by Richard Belzer

in People & Institutions, Regulatory Policy

Long time University of Chicago Law (and recent Harvard Law) professor Cass Sunstein is expected to be nominated by President Obama to be the new Administrator of the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs. OIRA is the statutory office within the White House Office of Management and Budget that, among other things, has conducted centralized regulatory oversight on behalf of the president since 1981.

When Susan Dudley was nominated in 2006 to head this office, Neutral Source published an eight-part analysis of her "paper trail," which is summarized here. We undertook this task because her nomination generated controversy from certain activist groups, most notably Public Citizen, and we found significant factual discrepancies between the actual content of this paper trail and her critics claims about it.

We intend to repeat this effort, but Sunstein presents an unusually difficult challenge.

24 Feb 2009

Regulatory Review in the Obama Administration, Part 2:
Alive and well, reports to the contrary notwithstanding

by Richard Belzer

in Regulatory Policy

In a February 17 article, Politico reporter Josh Gerstein claims that "[i]n his first weeks in office, President Barack Obama shut down his predecessor’s system for reviewing regulations" and "managed to take all these actions with nary a mention from the White House press corps." Gerstein further claims that this "escaped notice because they were never announced by the White House Press Office and were never placed on the White House web site."

Gerstein's reporting is erroneous.

3 Feb 2009

Regulatory Review in the Obama Administration, Part 1:
Executive Order 13497

by Richard Belzer

in Regulatory Policy

On January 30, President Obama signed Executive Order 13497, which begins the process of changing the way the Office of Management and Budgwet performs centralized review of draft proposed and draft final regulations. In a memorandum to agency heads, the President also announced a plan to produce "a set of recommendations" within 100 days (~ May 14, 2009).

Texts for both documents are provided below.

12 Nov 2008

Petition for Correction to the Office of Management and Budget Concerning the Draft 2008 Report to Congress on the Benefits and Costs of Federal Regulation

by Richard Belzer

in Information Quality

On November 7, 2008, Regulatory Checkbook -- Neutral Sourcve's sister nonprofit organization -- filed a public comment on the Office of Management and Budget's draft 2008 Report to Congress on the Benefits and Costs of Federal Regulation.

This public comment also was submitted as a formal Petition for Correction under OMB's Information Quality Guidelines (PDF). Under those guidelines, influential information OMB disseminates must be substantively and presentionally objective, transparent and reproducible, and provide utility for its intended purposes of informing Congress and the public.

The draft Report does not satisfy these information quality standards.

OMB is obligated by its own guidelines to respond within 60 days (i.e., by January 6, 2009).

25 Sep 2008

Benefits and Costs of Federal Regulation:
2008 draft report published for public comment

by Richard Belzer

in Regulatory Economics

The Office of Management and Budget has published its 2008 draft report to Congress on the benefits and costs of federal reguilation. OMB is required by lawe to publish this report every year.

Public comments are due by Friday, November 7, 2008.

1 Feb 2008

Objectivity in Risk Assessment:
The National Intelligence Estimate on Iran, Part 4

by Richard Belzer

in Regulatory Policy, Regulatory Science

The subject of the 2007 National Intelligence Estimate of Iran's nuclear weapons program is not the dominant subject of news reporting that it was when we first posted on it. However, a conventional narrative has developed to the effect that Iran's nuclear ambitions and developmental efforts are no longer a legitimate concern.

Today we hope to finish our series on this subject showing why this narrative is based on value-based preferences that various people and interest groups hold, and is not supported by the NIE itself.


More...

6 Dec 2007

Objectivity in Risk Assessment:
The National Intelligence Estimate on Iran, Part 3

by Richard Belzer

in Information Quality, Regulatory Policy

The web is chock full of commentary on the recently released summary of the National Intelligence Estimate on Iran. (We emphasize summary because the body of the NIE remains classified.) We've posted here and here on the NIE as a risk assessment document, noting that it claims to be an objective assessment not confounded by risk management (i.e., policy or political) concerns.

We've read much (but by no means all) of this news and commnetary and drawn some inferences we hope are useful. More...

4 Dec 2007

Objectivity in Risk Assessment:
The National Intelligence Estimate on Iran, Part 2

by Richard Belzer

in Regulatory Policy

Early today we posted the unclassified summary of the recent National Intelligence Estimate on Iran's nuclear intentions and capabilities. We said that while we could not comment on its substance -- the details leading to the published judgments remain classified -- the document itself appeared to be notable for its transparency of language, recognition of uncertainty, and the clarity with which it defined the probabilistic language used to describe both the substantive judgments reported and analysts' confidence in them.

Today's news reporting on the NIE shows why it is so important that risk assessments be performed in an objective manner: risk managers, other political actors, and the press often want risk assessments to support predefined narratives and policy views. In less than a day, many of them have stripped away the NIE's careful calibration of uncertainty, suggested that its judgments are colored by the expectation that it would be made public, and undermined the case for performing risk assessment by using it for partisan political purposes. More...

Objectivity in Risk Assessment:
National Intelligence Estimate of Iran's Nuclear Weapons Program

by Richard Belzer

in Regulatory Science

An unusual example of risk assessment appeared today in the news: the disclosure of an unclassified summary of the November National Intelligence Estimate (NIE) concerning Iran's nuclear weapons program. The document, which for obvious reasons is not transparent and reproducible, nevertheless is remarkably clear about the uncertainties which underlie its estimates. More...

16 Nov 2007

Can States Regulate Immigration? Part 4b
NY Governor abandons 3-tiered driver license plan

by Richard Belzer

in Regulatory Economics, Regulatory Policy

This week, New York Governor Elliot Spitzer abandoned his plan for a three-tiered driver license program that would have allowed illegal aliens to obtain an inferior-form license. More...

19 Sep 2007

OMB's Principles for Risk Analysis:
OMB's initial response to the National Academy of Sciences

by Richard Belzer

in Regulatory Policy, Regulatory Science

Today the Office of Management and Budget issued a memorandum to agency heads directing them to adhere to certain principles of risk analysis. The memorandum is OMB's initial response to the report of a National Research Council panel that OMB asked to review a 2006 proposed bulletin on risk assessment. That report called the proposed text "fundamentally flawed" and gave seven recommendations, one of which was that it be withdrawn.

A fair reading of the new memorandum is that OMB followed this specific recommendation. More...

13 Aug 2007

Benefit-cost Analysis and Real World Decision Making:
The case of homeland security equipment maintenance

by Richard Belzer

in Regulatory Economics

Critics say benefit-cost analysis is a bad tool for choosing whether to regulate. Supporters say it's a good tool because it mimics how people and institutions normally make rational decisions. Today's example is homeland security equipment purchased by the federal government but left unmaintained by local governments.
More...

27 Jul 2007

Who Pays the Cost of Regulation?
Insights from corporate income tax incidence

by Richard Belzer

in Regulatory Economics

Regulation is widely understood as a tax on the activity or person being regulated. Where these activities repair genuine market failures, benefits from regulation may result. If there are benefits from, say, automobile safety regulation, one would expect the beneficiaries to be persons who otherwise would have been killed or injured at the pre-regulatory safety level.

But what about the costs of regulation? Who bears them? More...