Economy Continues To Slide

Obama rushes to kill the economy in final months

Posted on May 17, 2016 by Sam RolleyViews: 6,674

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In an effort to ensure that Congress and the next president are powerless to reverse as many of his economy killing regulations as possible, President Barack Obama has rushed through $85 billion in new regulations since the beginning of the year.

The 44 new economically significant regulations were shoved through ahead of a May 23 deadline dubbed “Regulation Day” that officially marks Obama’s status as a lame duck.

“Once Regulation Day passes, the next Congress will have an opportunity to review the administration’s Lame Duck rules,” explained Sam Batkins, regulatory policy directory at the American Action Forum.

That’s why April was one of the busiest regulatory months this year.

And Obama made his regulatory rush count, creating an additional 13.9 million regulatory compliance hours for American businesses and costing every individual in the country an additional $116 in hidden regulatory taxes with his 44 new economically significant rules.

The costliest regulations just rammed through by the president include:

• Diligence for Financial Institutions: $2.5 billion
• Regulation of Smokeless Tobacco: $1.1 billion
• Transportation of Human and Animal Food: $998 million
• Blowout Preventer Systems: $890 million
• “Medicaid Mega Rule:” $471 million

“These regulatory costs essentially represent unchecked power for the president. Absent an intervention from the federal courts or a surprising supermajority in Congress, these rules will likely persist indefinitely,” Batkins said.

According to an AAF analysis of Obama’s regulatory scheming this year, the current administration has imposed nearly 40 percent more costly regulations than a president has at any point since 1996.

“Indeed, the administration has also approved three times as many economically significant rulemakings as were approved in 1996,” said Batkins.