House, Huizenga Pass Bill to Cut Red Tape, Protect Job Growth
Press Release
U.S. Rep. Bill Huizenga, MI-02, released the following statement today on voting with the House to examine the effects of government agency regulations on job creation:
"West Michigan prioritizes clean air and clean water and protecting our beautiful lakeshore, and I am working for that in Congress. Our state also is hurting for jobs, another of my top priorities in Congress. That's why I support the TRAIN Act --a bipartisan plan to direct the federal government to examine just how many duplicative layers of red tape the Environmental Protect Agency have, and their effects on job creation. We want to ensure that government is effectively and efficiently protecting our country's natural resources, without hurting global competiveness, jobs, or prices."
BACKGROUND:
· This bill, H.R. 2401, directs three expert agencies -- the Department of Commerce, the United States International Trade Commission, and the Department of Treasury -- to examine the combined effect and cost of major rules recently issued or planned by the EPA. Just eight of the EPA regulations addressed in this bill will cost the U.S. economy a minimum of $1 billion each. The study will find the cumulative effect of these costly rules on consumers, small businesses, state, local, and tribal governments, local and industry-specific labor markets, and agriculture.
· While the government figures out just how much its regulations will cost our country, H.R. 2401 will delay implementation of EPA's controversial Utility MACT rule and new transport rule to ensure that the economic impacts of these two major rules in conjunction with other EPA rules are fully understood. NERA Economic Consulting projects the costs of these two rules taken together could amount to $17.8 billion annually with a total cost of $184 billion (present value) for the period 2011-2030. The rules are also estimated to result in 1.44 million lost job-years by 2020 and an increase in electricity prices by 12% nationally and as high as 24% in certain states by 2016.
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