Tweet [1]
Bob Higgs inquires into the size of government in the U.S. [3] A slice:
According to Wayne Crews, who makes an annual estimate [4] of the cost of compliance with federal regulations alone, “Costs for Americans to comply with federal regulations reached $1.863 trillion in 2013”—which is equivalent to more than 13 percent of national income. Compliance with state and local government regulations surely adds a large amount to Crews’s estimate for federal compliance alone. No one needs to tell Americans, however, how onerous and exasperating the entire mass of government regulations and related red tape has become. Virtually every part of economic and social life now bears these heavy burdens, and any truly meaningful appraisal of the size of government today must take them into consideration along with the amounts the various governments are spending.
Nick Gillespie is rightly unimpressed by Marco Rubio’s and Mike Lee’s budget proposal [5].
Tim Carney is rightly unimpressed with Scott Walker [6]. A slice:
Walker’s tendency to buckle under to “our guys” shows us how he’ll behave when the subsidy-sucklers come calling. He will say “buzz off” to Planned Parenthood and the government unions, and good for him. But when the Wall Street lobbyists ask for special favors, or the manufacturers demand their subsidies — what do you think Walker will do?