3 ms·

Just because some areas of the law have changes in the regulations doesn't mean that the overall amount of regulation isn't increasing. Consider that the tax c

• tptacek 10y ago
  Huh? The tax code isn't even close to 70,000 pages long. What specific document are you claiming to be 70,000 pages long? The Standard Federal Tax Reporter? That's not the tax code.
  • wang_li 10y ago
    I see, you are correct. It's the explanatory material that has had to grow. While it's not a given, I would assume there there is a positive relationship between the code and the explainers.
    • Retra 10y ago
      Would you assume that if we added 300 pages of "exceptions to the rules" that we would be increasing regulation?
• rayiner 10y ago
  The number of pages of regulations can increase even as the actual economic effect of regulation goes down. Air cargo deregulation is a good example: http://mercatus.org/publication/unleashing-innovation-deregulation-air-cargo-transportation http://mercatus.org/publication/unleashing-innovation-deregu.... NLRB is another good example. I guarantee you it has more pages of regulations than it did in the 1940s--but nobody would argue it has as much power over the economy as it did back then. Indeed, increased pages of regulations is as much evidence of decreased regulatory authority as the opposite. In the 1940s and 1950s, agencies regulated top-down pursuant to broad discretionary standards that could be summarized in a few pages. Today, agencies have to issue detailed regulations, justified by years of analysis and tens of thousands of pages of records, to change the lightbulbs.
  • wang_li 10y ago
    I wouldn't think that an agency's ability to wield power and the amount of regulation are the same thing.