Does Extending a Comment Period Equal Regulatory Delay?

Does extending a comment period equal regulatory delay? The short answer is “yes.” Numerous media accounts suggest that an extension of a comment period amounts to a delay in a regulation, no matter the length of the extension. Given that many rulemaking proceedings span several years before a rule is finalized, does an extension of the comment period by 30 to 60 days really count as a meaningful delay? After reviewing more than 360 “major” and “economically significant” rulemakings from the past ten years, I can report that the answer is “yes.” Rules that allow more time for comments are generally associated with longer rulemaking periods. Of course, rulemaking time cannot simply be explained by a longer comment period. These comment extensions should be viewed as a symptom, and not as the cause, of regulatory delay, as the rulemakings receiving extensions are often controversial, expensive, or subject to intense litigation. The length of a comment period is obviously but one metric to use in examining a rule’s life. To conduct our study of regulatory delay and comment periods, we examined major completed rulemakings in the Unified Agenda, from the fall 2006 edition to the most recent spring 2014 edition. There were numerous rulemakings listed as “completed” but that were actually withdrawn, and we removed those entries. In the end, 361 remaining major rulemakings actually found their way into the Federal Register. Here’s the bottom line on delay: rulemakings with extended comment periods took almost twice as long to complete as rules without such extensions. For example, of the 361 rulemakings in the sample, regulators extended the comment period for 88 of them. On average, those measures took 1,133 days to complete, or 3.1 years. However, using the median is probably a better measure of central tendency because the range extended to over 16 years for one rulemaking. (We measured “length of rulemaking” from the first publication in the Unified Agenda to the final publication in the Federal Register). Using the median, these periods shrank to 795 days – or 2.1 years. Compare those figures to rules without an extended comment period: 351 days, or 0.96 years (median). It certainly appears that extending the comment period is associated with a delay. But there are a few caveats. Because we defined the length of rulemaking as the initial Unified Agenda entry to final publication in the Federal Register, there were several rulemakings that, because they were never originally listed in the Unified Agenda, have negative time horizons. For example, interim final rules that agencies do not initially list in the Unified Agenda, but that later appear in the Agenda, obviously do not have extended comment periods for their proposed versions. The rule establishing preventative coverage for group health plans under the Affordable Care Act, for example, was listed in the fall 2010 Unified Agenda, which was published on November 29, 2010. However, the Unified Agenda listing occurred after the agency issued an interim final rule, published on July 19, 2010. Thus, the rulemaking had a negative time horizon because the first notice was a publication in the Federal Register, not in the Unified Agenda. Excluding these rulemakings (just 24 in total) does not significantly alter the results. For example, the median period for rules with an extended comment period grew to 2.25 years from 2.1 years. For all other rules, the median length of the time for completion grew to 1.04 years from 0.96. Our methodology does fail to recognize that agencies probably begin working on long-term actions before notice in the Unified Agenda. But what it fails to capture in that respect, it also assumes the rulemaking is not final until the Federal Register publication. As previous research has shown, there can be a significant lag – up to 197 days – between when the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs finishes its review of a final rule and the publication of that rule in the Federal Register. Beyond establishing overall length of rulemaking, and demonstrating that extensions of comment periods are associated with a regulatory life around twice as long as those without extensions, Unified Agenda data allow us to contrast target publication dates with actual publication dates. For rules that provided a target publication date in their Unified Agenda entry, we were able to compare the scheduled publication date with the actual Federal Register date. For the sample as a whole, the “gap” between the Unified Agenda target and actual publication was a median of just ten days, which is somewhat incredible considering the life of most rulemakings. Yet, rules with extended comment periods missed their target publication by a median time of 49.5 days, compared to just seven days for rulemakings without comment extensions. The averages for extended and “normal” rules were 193 days and 60 days, respectively. This demonstrates, generally, that extending the comment period is associated with longer rulemaking timelines and that these rules are more likely to miss their initial publication dates. The above evidence makes sense intuitively. A rulemaking that extends the comment period by 30 to 60 days is likely to take longer, and as the data demonstrate, it will probably miss its scheduled publication by roughly 50 days. Although there are countless factors involved in rulemaking delay, it is clear that extending the comment period will likely result in a lengthier process

It Is Premature to Label a Regulatory Budget Unconstitutional

In their recent essay appearing in The Regulatory Review, Scott Slesinger and Robert Weissman declared that Executive Order 13,771, which directs agencies to repeal two existing regulations for every new regulation they seek to promulgate, is unconstitutional. The constitutionality of regulatory reform appears to be an emerging theme in 2017, as at least one other group has argued separately that another tool for regulatory reform—the Congressional Review Act, passed by both houses of Congress and signed by President Bill Clinton in 1996—is also unconstitutional. Although Slesinger and Weissman might have legitimate policy objections to Executive Order 13,771 and its application of regulatory budgeting, claims of that order’s unconstitutionality are premature. Can anyone point to one instance when the Trump Administration rescinded a regulatory standard to satisfy the one-in, two-out order? According to the American Action Forum (AAF), the Administration has not finalized a single major regulatory action that would trigger the need for two or more deregulatory actions under the executive order. It is hard to see how anyone can have standing in court to challenge an executive order that has yet to lead to any changes in regulations. Slesinger and Weissman’s argument explaining the lawsuit filed by their organizations—the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) and Public Citizen, respectively—is filled with speculative language that shows that any constitutional suit against the executive order is far from ripe for judicial review. Words and phrases such as “potentially,” “will make,” “would inflict,” and “will have,” can be found throughout their essay. Are not courts more interested in actual harms that result in victims from agency action? What harm can Public Citizen or the NRDC claim from the executive order, which has yet to lead to a repeal of a regulation about which they are concerned? Furthermore, Slesinger and Weissman, along with other critics of regulatory budgeting, seem to forget crucial language contained in EO 13,771: “unless prohibited by law,” a phrase that appears four times in the executive order. In rhetoric, strawmen are erected and burned that seem to depict an alternate reality where the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) must choose between clean air and clean water. Because there are statutes directing EPA to preserve both, the Agency will not have to abandon particulate matter standards if it seeks to implement a clean water rule. If it did, the Agency would surely lose in court. The dictates of existing statutory law still remain; Executive Order 13,771 does not change the law, just the priorities. This executive order, as countless previous executive orders have done, merely moves the margins of regulation. There were no cries of unconstitutionality when President Barack Obama issued Executive Order 13,563 directing agencies to conduct retrospective review to see if they should “modify, streamline, expand, or repeal” existing regulations. Although progressives had policy objections when President Obama repealed or significantly modified rules, there were no constitutional lawsuits racing toward the courts. Indeed, President Obama cut costs from final rules more than 100 times during his Administration. Would President Trump be prohibited from replicating and building on those successes? Marcus Peacock, who led the “landing team” at the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs during the first few months of 2017, offered some hints about how the one-in, two-out budget might work at a recent Resources for the Future event. He cited both Canada and the United Kingdom, which have operated regulatory budgets without abandoning clean air or water standards. In those countries, reducing paperwork—through recordkeeping and reporting requirements—dominates the deregulatory actions. Peacock predicted similar actions for the United States. He stated, “I’m guessing we’re going to find something similar. And a lot of the deregulatory actions that people will focus on first are those that simply make it easier for people to fill out paperwork or just fill out less paperwork, probably.” From that remark, it is hard to spot the fundamental constitutional conflict between Executive Order 13,771 and existing law. Indeed, with every administration, regulators trim paperwork and reduce regulatory costs without flouting the intent of Congress or their statutory directives. For example, during the Obama Administration, the U.S. Department of Transportation revised its rule on driver vehicle inspection reports. This rulemaking relieved truck drivers from having to file “no defect” reports. Essentially, they no longer had to report that their trips from one city to another occurred without incident. According to the Obama Administration, this saved $1.7 billion annually by cutting 46.6 million paperwork burden hours. This is not to say that implementation of the executive order will be a walk in the park. On the contrary, it will be difficult. Fulfilling the executive order’s requirements will demand a robust retrospective review and program evaluation initiative from agencies. Perhaps this effort might give rise to new agencies that will aid in the effort. Following Executive Order 13,771 might prove difficult for some agencies, but the action itself is hardly unconstitutional. If the Administration starts uprooting particulate matter and carbon monoxide standards as a prerequisite for issuing new major rules, perhaps there will be a case. If instead, the margins of existing regulations are reworked to decrease costs—which, in some cases, is no easy task—then the executive order will remain in place for the foreseeable future

President Obama’s Budget Sets Regulatory Priorities Too

The long-awaited release of President Obama’s budget will once again ignite debate in Washington, D.C. over the nation’s spending priorities. But the budget is more than a roadmap for federal spending; it also emphasizes the administration’s regulatory priorities. In the budget, the administration touts its lodestar Executive Order 13,356 on regulatory reform, arguing that “the Administration carefully weighs the costs and benefits of rules – not by reducing difficult questions to problems of arithmetic, but by carefully weighing economic effects and also by taking into account qualitative factors, including fairness and human dignity.” The budget then repeats a figure from the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs’ (OIRA) 2012 draft report to Congress, which states that cumulative net benefits of major rules topped $91 billion during the first three years of the Obama Administration. Of course, under Executive Order 13,563, the work of regulatory reform is supposed to be an ongoing venture. To that effect, the budget promises to continue conducting a process of regulatory “look back.” The spending priorities in the President’s budget will also have direct regulatory implications. Yet less than two months into the sequester, it is still not clear how frozen budget appropriations will impact new regulations. The budget does not address this issue – nor does it anticipate any slowdown in the production of new regulations. It does, of course, request money for regulatory agencies. Below are a few highlights: Finally, although the budget does not direct funding to independent regulatory agencies, Congress did recently receive a separate budget request from the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC), a key agency tasked with implementing many Dodd-Frank regulations. In the past, CFTC has asked for substantial budget increases and more staff to regulate the swaps and derivatives markets. CFTC’s FY 2014 request seeks an additional$315 million in funding and no new full-time equivalent employees. However Commissioner Scott O’Malia notes in his dissent from the agency’s request that the requested level of funding is 52 percent higher than the current funding level. Commissioner Jill Sommers also dissented from the budget request. If history is any guide, Congress is unlikely to provide a 50 percent increase for CFTC. Moreover, because of the sequester and other spending fights, other appropriated spending will likely remain stagnant. Compared with the previous four years, the pace of regulation in 2013 has not been excessive. Aside from a few major proposals, including moving to Tier 3 emissions standards and instituting the Volcker Rule, fiscal constraints will make a massive uptick in regulatory activity unlikely over the next year

What Will the Regulatory Landscape Look Like in 2021?

As The Regulatory Review celebrates its five-year anniversary, what will the regulatory world look like during the next five years? More acrimony, legal and political battles, debate about the role of the White House Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs (OIRA)? Yes to all, regardless of which party occupies the White House in 2017. Given the reality that Democrats are overwhelmingly favored to retain the White House next year, it is perhaps more appropriate to talk about the future of regulation through that lens. Yet, the failure of political prognostication lately has made fools out of virtually everyone in the process. In the immediate future (the remainder of 2016), President Barack Obama will continue to put the finishing touches on his regulatory legacy, publishing long-delayed measures. As of this writing, the Occupational Health and Safety Administration has just published its rule on silica exposure, a priority for public health groups and unions. The Administration also recently finalized the controversial “conflict of interest” or fiduciary rule for investment advisers, which was proposed initially in 2010 and re-proposed in 2015. Finally, expect the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency to put the final touches on rules curbing greenhouse gas emissions from fracking and heavy-duty trucks by the summer or fall. These rules do not mean President Obama will accomplish everything on his ambitious agenda. The Administration likely will not have time to finish additional methane rules or regulate greenhouse gas emissions from refineries or agriculture—two other major sources. Those tasks will likely be left to the next Democratic administration. What can we expect in 2017 and beyond? Given the current battles over income inequality and the nation’s broken immigration system, it is probably safe to predict those areas will receive increased attention in the future. President Obama has already publicly tried to fill some of the gaps through policies he could not accomplish on the legislative front. Immigration executive orders—now under Supreme Court review—and extensions to minimum wage protections for government contractors are two examples. If any branch of Congress remains in Republican control in the near future, expect the “Pen and Phone” approach to immigration reform and income inequality to continue, at least absent Supreme Court action. If Hillary Clinton becomes President, expect a major push on renewable energy—perhaps even an unprecedented effort. She has pledged a 700 percent increase in solar power by 2020. Solar capacity would need to rise from roughly 20 gigawatts to approximately 140 gigawatts. This would likely require 50 percent more land area than the state of Rhode Island occupies. Such an expansion in solar capacity would probably require congressional action, but more regulation of coal and natural gas could make solar a more attractive option within the next few years. If U.S. Senator Bernie Sanders (D-Vt.) becomes President, renewables will also be an agenda item, in addition to what appears to be a third round of Corporate Average Fuel Economy standards for cars and light-duty trucks. The current standard is 54.5 miles per gallon by 2025; any platform that calls for a 40 percent overall reduction in greenhouse gas emissions by 2030 will heavily rely on new regulations from EPA to curb emissions and from the U.S. Department of Energy to promote energy efficiency—or what Senator Sanders calls the “low-hanging fruit” of energy investments. Hedging bets and assuming that a Republican wins this November, expect regulatory modernization bills to pass the House easily, as they have in the past, and then bump up against the 60-vote threshold in the Senate. A regulatory budget has gained significant attention recently, but its fate likely lies in its form. Would any moderate Democrats support a flexible regulatory budget that allocates to each agency a set amount annually, or will legislators try to capture the United Kingdom’s “one-in-two-out” system of regulatory budgeting? Yet even with a unified conservative government, do not expect every regulatory reform measure to pass or even to alter the regulatory world significantly. A strict budget could accomplish the latter notion, but logistics and political concerns would likely shutter any attempt. The modern regulatory environment was created over decades, and given the general inertia in Washington, D.C., one or two reform bills will not undo the system. However, they could make notable changes at the margins: fewer major rules, more procedural requirements for agencies, a stronger OIRA, and greater oversight of independent agencies. There is also the remote chance of broad bipartisan reform: heightened transparency at OIRA and licensing reform. Currently, OIRA’s record on transparency is mixed, at best. As the U.S. Government Accountability Office has noted, OIRA has completed just a fraction of the proposed transparency recommendations. Delayed meeting postings and explanations for “withdrawn” rules are two other areas where Republicans and Democrats could likely find common ground. Occupational licensing reform, to the extent the federal government has a role, is another area where bipartisan compromise could be forged in the coming years. In sum, for those hoping for a sea change in the regulatory landscape over the next five years, prepare for disappointment. This is Washington, D.C. President Obama has averaged roughly 80 major rules annually during his tenure. If a Republican is elected, expect slightly fewer major rules. If a Democrat wins, expect roughly the same amount, with a particular focus on curtailing income inequality and greenhouse gas emissions. Despite platitudes about the critical importance of each election, the combination of Congress, the courts, and the politicization of almost every issue limit the possibility for fundamental regulatory reform. Sea change takes decades, not years. This essay is part of The Regulatory Review’s sixteen-part series, RegBlog@5

The Constitutional Executive Order on Regulatory Budgets

The constitutional concerns that Scott Slesinger and Robert Weissman express over Executive Order 13,771 are little different from the kind of policy objections raised during previous administrations about other presidential efforts to oversee the work of regulatory agencies. Their constitutional argument suffers from at least five significant flaws. First, the general lack of regulatory output during the first few months of the Trump Administration is a political choice. It is fair to attack the Administration’s low output based on one’s political views, but the fact is that every administration’s regulatory output ebbs and flows, often due to politics. (Just examine the slowdown in regulation during the Obama Administration in the lead-up to the 2012 election.) Absent statutory and judicial deadlines, every President can determine the timing and the volume of major regulatory activity. Second, Slesinger and Weissman exaggerate the extent to which President Trump’s executive order blocks regulations. They claim that “the order prohibits agencies from issuing new significant regulations unless they repeal at least two other regulations to offset the new rule’s costs.” But this statement is belied by the implementation of Executive Order 13,771 to date. In May, for example, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) proposed a major rule with more than $60 million in costs. It did so without repealing two other rules to offset the costs. In its analysis, HHS concluded that “the implications of the rule’s costs and cost savings will be further considered in the context of our compliance with Executive Order 13,771.” One-in, two-out did not stop this measure. Third, Slesinger and Weissman seem to misconstrue the process for implementing Executive Order 13,771. Issuing a major new rule does not first require the immediate repeal of two old regulations. According to White House guidance, the mere identification of deregulatory measures need only be completed “in a reasonable period of time.” This hardly upsets the constitutional balance between Article I and Article II. It simply establishes a presidential preference for the volume and impact of regulation. Fourth, contrary to Slesinger and Weissman’s claim that “it is not remotely possible” that trimming administrative regulation, reporting, and recordkeeping can offset the cost of new safeguards, there is evidence from the Obama Administration that it can. In 2014, the U.S. Department of Transportation repealed 46.6 million hours of paperwork, cutting more than$1.7 billion in costs. The next year, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) finalized new ozone standards for $1.4 billion in costs. Likewise, in 2012, the HHS cut 5.1 million hours of paperwork and eliminated$940 million in annual costs. The next year, EPA implemented new particulate matter standards, at a cost of $350 million. This is not to say it will be easy to offset the costs entirely with less paperwork, but it is not impossible. Finally, Slesinger and Weissman’s constitutional objections sweep much too broadly. Arguably, the same critiques they make with respect to Executive Order 13,771 could be leveled against the very concept of regulatory review by the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs (OIRA), an interagency review process first established during the Reagan Administration. In the same way it has expressed concerns about Executive Order 13,771’s slowing down rulemaking, Public Citizen has claimed that OIRA “impedes agencies’ ability to issue the rules that Congress mandates.” Other critics have similarly argued that OIRA unnecessarily slows regulatory activity and places an undue emphasis on costs. Yet, there have been no credible claims that the OIRA review process raises constitutional concerns, even though it serves as a check on rules with statutory mandates and often delays agency action. Instead, six consecutive presidential administrations have embraced OIRA’s interagency review process. OIRA review is constitutional because Presidents have recognized that they have broad discretion in how they execute the law. When President Barack Obama formally returned a 2011 ozone rule to EPA, then-OIRA Administrator Cass Sunstein reminded EPA that the law allows “meaningful guidance and oversight so that each agency’s regulatory actions are consistent with…the President’s priorities.” Sunstein noted that the ozone action was not mandatory at that time and the President still had discretion in how to implement the law. That action was controversial, admittedly, but, as far as I am aware, there were no protests from Public Citizen or the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) that OIRA’s action was unconstitutional. Executive Order 13,771 might lead to similarly provocative actions, but those will be procedural in nature, not constitutional. Once again, all of these considerations—the uncertainty over the executive order and whether it has yet resulted in the repeal of old rules or any slow-down in new rules—demonstrate that a lawsuit is hardly ripe for review. How can anyone argue that it is unconstitutional to slow down the regulatory process when it is not possible to point to a rule with a statutory or judicial deadline that has been held up by the executive order? Slesinger and Weissman seem to acknowledge that no significant rule has been repealed because of the executive order. But then, how can they argue that it is unconstitutional for the President to call for the repeal of existing rules when the Trump Administration has not repealed a major rule? Slesinger and Weissman also complain that it is unconstitutional to reduce regulatory output to a trickle. Was President Obama’s “regulatory freeze” then unconstitutional because it held up rules at the opening of his Administration? It is hard to distinguish the effects that Slesinger and Weissman attribute to Executive Order 13,771 from the explicitly intended effects of White House directives that have for years routinely halted regulations at the start of each new administration. If Executive Order 13,771 is unconstitutionally intrusive, why did NRDC and Public Citizen not sue over President Donald Trump’s transitional regulatory moratorium? Even if a lawsuit challenging Executive Order 13,771 were ripe for judicial consideration, what has been left unsaid is the incredible burden of convincing a court that the executive order is unconstitutional. Although courts have struck down unilateral executive actions in the past, those instances are rare, and I can find no action of “general applicability,” like Executive Order 13,771, that courts have invalidated. Slesinger and Weissman might well have political and policy objections to the “one-in, two-out” executive order that are worth debating, but those objections will not be sufficient to convince a court to find constitutional deficiencies in the exercise of a kind of executive discretion that Presidents have enjoyed for decades

What the Unified Agenda Tells Us About Regulation’s Impending Burdens

The recently published Unified Agenda of federal regulatory activity shows a total of 136 regulations that are “economically significant” – that is, those that will have an impact of $100 million or more. Out of these 136 active rulemakings still at the pre-rule, proposed rule, or final rule stages of development, the Agenda lists specific authorizing legislation for forty-two. The Affordable Care Act (ACA) received ten mentions, while agencies cited Dodd-Frank, the Wall Street reform legislation, as the authorizing authority for four pending rules. For those health care regulations under the ACA that have advanced far enough along in the rulemaking process to have generated agency cost estimates, the rules would impose up to$3.3 billion in combined costs and more than 580,000 in combined paperwork burden hours. The most significant ACA regulation on tap for 2013 will address benefit and payment parameters and would require health issuers to incur “administrative and hardware costs.” Likewise, states complying with the law would incur similar burdens. Agency analysts have concluded that at least when issuers of health insurance do not receive compensating payments from the federal government to cover these burdens, the insurers “could pass on to beneficiaries through premium increases.” Taking a look at the four pending Dodd-Frank regulations listed in the Agenda, three of these rules could impose more than 1.4 million paperwork burden hours and $101 million in costs combined. One Dodd-Frank regulation addressing fees for large bank holding companies does not have available cost-benefit information listed. However, according to the White House, the measure will collect fees on financial institutions with assets of$50 billion or greater in order fund the new Office of Financial Research, the Financial Stability Oversight Council, and the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation. Additional economically significant rules under Dodd-Frank are likely underway, but the Unified Agenda excludes cost information for the independent agencies that are implementing the financial reform law. Until independent agencies produce detailed regulatory impact analyses, these regulatory totals should be viewed as a floor, not a ceiling, for pending activity. For example, we know that the Volcker rule, scheduled for publication in January, will likely impose more than 6 million paperwork burden hours, but it does not appear in the Agenda as a significant regulation. Annual stress test rules, Basel III capital margins, and standards for remittance transfers are also notable Dodd-Frank regulations scheduled for 2013, but are not covered under Executive Order 12,866. Beyond discerning the legislative triggers that drive new regulatory activity, what can the recent Unified Agenda tell us about the business sectors that are most likely to be affected in 2013 by rules that are in the pipeline? A general answer can be gleaned by looking at the sections of the Code of Federal Regulations (CFR) that will be affected by the new rules, as each of the CFR’s fifty titles approximately represents a different sector of the economy. Of the 136 economically significant regulatory actions in the latest agenda, Title 7 (Agriculture), recorded the most citations: 15 rules. However, these economically significant agricultural proposals do not always translate into true regulatory burdens, as many of them merely transfer money from the federal government to another entity. Other sections of the CFR affected include Title 40, on the Environment, which had ten citations, and Title 42, on Public Health. Both EPA and the Department of Energy are likely to publish regulations in 2013 with economic impacts in the billions of dollars. Of course, the designation of rules as “economically significant” and the summary information in the Unified Agenda only tells part of the story on the burdens of new regulation. As the saying goes, the devil is in the details

Valuing a Ton of Particulate Matter

When it comes to regulatory policy, we rarely encounter simple answers. For example, what is the cost of emitting carbon dioxide into the atmosphere? Depending on the underlying assumptions, the answer to that question can vary from $11 per ton to an extreme of$105 per ton. And that answer may change over time with additional data and analysis. Measuring the cost of particulate matter—the tiny particles or soot floating in the air from auto exhaust and other sources of combustion that cause respiratory illness—yields a similarly wide expense range. Yet the monetary value assigned to particulate matter reductions and other clean air benefits plays an important role in policymaking because agencies often rely on these estimates to justify new regulations. Indeed, the Supreme Court weighed in on the issue last year in a case that challenged environmental regulations to lower emissions of particulate matter and other toxins from power plants. Litigants sparred over the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) calculation, which translated to $1 billion in clean air benefits per 912 tons of reduced particulate matter. But this ratio,$1 billion in benefits for a 912-ton decline in particulate matter emissions, is not standard across major rulemakings by EPA or other federal agencies. Consider automobile fuel efficiency standards set by EPA and the U.S. Department of Transportation in effect through 2025. The agencies estimated improved fuel economy would reduce particulate matter exposure by 1,254 tons, which agency officials equated to $1.6 billion in benefits. The fuel standards for 2012 to 2016 rulemakings, on the other hand, cut more than three times as much particulate matter, yet generated just$850 million in benefits. The final phase of recent greenhouse gas standards for heavy-duty trucks offers an even starker example of the disparate values assigned to particulate matter reduction. The new standards for trucks cut particulate matter and nitrogen oxide by more than 576,000 tons combined. Yet regulators equated these particulate matter and nitrogen oxide reductions—which are commonly combined to measure tonnage reductions—to just $15.3 billion in benefits. This means the agencies treated emissions reductions from trucks as 41 times less valuable than the pollution reductions from power plants discussed before the Supreme Court. I reviewed a sample of 11 recent EPA rulemakings and found that to generate$1 billion in clean air benefits, the average regulation had to eliminate 5,416 tons of air pollution. For perspective, the nation emitted 4.9 million tons of particulate matter and 12.2 million tons of nitrogen oxide in 2014. Thus, regulators may value a 0.04 percent reduction in pollution at $1 billion. The range of reductions needed to generate$1 billion in benefits invites inquiry into why there is so much variation in the estimated benefit of removing one ton of particulate matter or nitrogen oxide from the atmosphere. Generally, regulations controlling for “mobile” emissions—in cars, for example— require more reductions (8,879 tons) to generate the same benefits than emissions from “stationary” sources like power plants (2,530 tons). Surveying the 11 relevant rulemakings, however, is hardly a sufficient sample size to draw any firm conclusions. Conflicting policies from the White House’s Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs may help explain the calculation variances, at least in part. The Office generally assumes that “all fine particles, regardless of their chemical composition, are equally potent in causing premature mortality.” However, another assumption acknowledges that per-ton reduction benefit estimates are based on a national analysis, which “may not reflect local variability” in factors such as population density, public health, and weather patterns. Assuming uniformity yet admitting benefits change by location may help explain the differing calculations found in major regulations. The relationship between greenhouse gas and particulate matter emissions likewise reveals inconsistent ratios across different rulemakings. For example, automobile fuel efficiency standards through 2025 aim to eliminate more than 1.9 billion cumulative tons of greenhouse gas, with a commensurate reduction of 26,326 tons of particulate matter and nitrogen oxide. This yields a ratio of 24,880 tons of greenhouse gas reduction for every one ton of particulate matter or nitrogen oxide avoided. On the other extreme, the heavy-duty truck standards mentioned above seek to eliminate one billion tons of greenhouse gasses while reducing particulate matter and nitrogen oxide by 576,000 tons; the resulting ratio of 1,820 tons of greenhouse gas per ton of particulate matter or nitrogen oxide brings the pollutant groups much closer together than auto emissions standards. I also faced a small sample size of major greenhouse gas regulations—only five rules—but on average it takes 35,370 fewer tons of greenhouse gas to cut a single ton of particulate matter or nitrogen oxide. If future U.S. Presidents quadruple the efforts of the Obama Administration to cut greenhouse gas emissions, then—holding the ratio I uncovered in my survey constant—the calculated particulate matter benefits could eclipse $1 trillion cumulatively. Regardless of the specific dollar value of benefits per ton in the future, with 17.1 million tons of particulate matter and nitrogen oxide emitted annually, and a regulatory agenda designed to address greenhouse gas emissions into the next decade, particulate matter reduction benefits will continue to play an important role in upcoming regulatory analyses. Even though the nation has already witnessed much Supreme Court litigation over EPA regulations and their benefit-cost analyses, I expect particulate matter reductions will continue to cause controversy between the regulated and the regulators for many years to come