The Cost of Government Day Report, published annually by Americans for Tax Reform Foundation, measures the number of calendar days Americans must work to pay off spending and regulatory burdens at all levels of government. In 2011, Americans labored 224 days to pay Uncle Sam—until August 12. 77 days went solely towards paying off regulatory costs. These costs will only grow under the aggressive regulatory regime envisioned by the Obama Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). Coupled with the existing 77 day burden, proposed EPA regulations promise to increase the costs of electricity and household items for all Americans.

In a 2008 talk with the San Francisco Chronicle, then-Senator Obama boasted that his emission reduction plan would cause electricity prices to “necessarily skyrocket.” As President, Obama quickly pushed for higher energy prices through the American Clean Energy and Security Act of 2009, better known as “Cap and Trade.” While the Act did not pass the Senate, the 2009 Cost of Government Day Report estimated that Cap and Trade would have increased the Cost of Government by three additional days.

The failure of Cap and Trade to net legislative success inspired the Obama Administration to pivot to the EPA to pursue its environmental agenda. Enabled by unaccountable bureaucrats, the EPA enacts much more harm than the politically-conscious Congress could ever achieve.

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The Senate votes this week on a small business tax-break bill which also contains controversial provisions to boost community-bank loans to small business. That is, Washington wants to “nudge” small banks into making loans that they’d otherwise avoid. Kind of like what the government did with home mortgage lending, with results some party poopers might characterize as catastrophic, but hey, who’s paying attention to things like that anyway.

One tries in vain to argue that the answer to recovery is not to artificially stimulate anything, or to overrule prices and rates in the marketplace; those are signals about underlying realities to heed and allow to play out. But beyond that, we must cut regulations that paralyze business and job creation. The starting point is to inventory all the regulations that impact a small business as it grows, and set about rolling them back.

Below is the rough inventory I’ve compiled, but I’m sure it’s out of date and some things have changed. And this doesn’t even address industry-specific rules (see endnote), themselves desperately in need of reform. And it certainly doesn’t address yet-to-come from the new financial reform and Obamacare legislation. I welcome any additions and subtractions.

FEDERAL WORKPLACE REGULATION IMPOSED ON GROWING BUSINESSES* (Draft—Wayne Crews)

ONE EMPLOYEE

• Fair Labor Standards Act (overtime and minimum wage [27% min. wage increase since 1990])
• Social Security matching and deposits
• Medicare, FICA
• Military Selective Service Act (90 days leave for reservists; rehire discharged veterans)
• Equal Pay Act (no sex discrimination in wages)
• Immigration Reform Act (eligibility must be documented)
• Federal Unemployment Tax Act (unemployment compensation)
• Employee Retirement Income Security Act (standards for pension and benefit plans)
• Occupational Safety and Health Act
• Polygraph Protection Act

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