On the recordSeptember 21, 2016
The REVIEW Act applies to all new billion-dollar rules. That is for one simple reason: the harm that wasting billions of dollars in unnecessary compliance costs does to job creation, productive investment, and economic recovery. Those costs should not have to be incurred during ultimately successful litigation challenging new billion-dollar rules. The amendment is concerned primarily with transfer rules that authorize the flow of funding between Federal healthcare accounts for seniors. With respect to those rules, there is no need for concern that the bill would impede the operation of those rules. To my knowledge, there has never been a billion-dollar transfer rule, much less one affecting seniors, that has been challenged in court, nor am I am aware of any reason to expect that one ever will be challenged. The bill, of course, only requires a stay if a timely challenge to a rule is brought in court. As for other rules that may be within the amendment's scope, if such rules are needed, then agencies can avoid the bill's application by coming up with effective regulations that cost less than $1 billion a year. That is a goal to be pursued, not blocked. If, in an unusual case, the needed solution truly must cost a billion dollars a year or more, then the decision to adopt that solution is a decision Congress should make, not an agency.…





