Tag Archives: regulatory state

Losing Our Freedom, One Appliance At A Time

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Remember when the Biden administration told us that they had no intention of limiting gas stoves? Well, that was then; this is now.

On Monday, The Daily Caller reported the following:

The Biden administration finalized an energy efficiency rule for stoves on Monday after claiming that it has no intention to ban gas-powered models.

The Department of Energy (DOE) published the final rule in accordance with a court order that requires the agency to publish the rule by the end of January. The administration proposed an aggressive efficiency regulation for stoves in February 2023 and subsequently promised that it is not attempting to ban gas stoves, calling suggestions to the contrary “misinformation.”

Compliance with the rules will be required for newly-manufactured products starting in January 2028, according to the DOE. The regulation applies to electric cooktops, gas cooktops, stand-alone electric cooktops, stand-alone gas cooktops and ovens.

…The rules are likely to make certain models more expensive up front, but the government contends that the rule will save Americans money on their utility bills in the long run by reducing the amount of energy their stoves use, according to The Washington Post.

“The new standards will also require only a small portion of models to make modest improvements to their energy efficiency to match the level of efficiency already demonstrated by the majority of the market today,” according to the DOE. “For example, approximately 97 percent of gas stove models and 77 percent of smooth electric stove models on the market already meet these standards.”

The article concludes:

A June 2023 Harvard CAPS Harris poll showed that nearly 70% of respondents oppose policies that would amount to a de facto gas stove ban. Over 80% of Republican respondents and 71% of independents are opposed to such policies, joined by 55% of Democrats polled in the survey.

Beyond stoves, the Biden DOE has also sought to impose energy efficiency regulations for items like water heaters, furnaces and pool pump motors. The administration has also spent hundreds of millions of dollars to help state and municipal governments pursue building codes meant to “decarbonize” buildings.

Neither the DOE nor the White House responded immediately to requests for comment.

The reason the U.S, Constitution requires Congress to make laws is that the members of Congress are elected and therefore accountable to the people. The regulatory state has no Constitutional basis other than Congress not doing its job. There is currently a case before the Supreme Court dealing with the regulatory state. That case is Chevron v. National Resources Defense Council.  Hopefully a ruling from the Court that is in line with the Constitution will save us from this nonsense.

Policies Matter

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One of the successes of the Trump administration was the growth of small business and the growth of the middle class during his administration. There were a lot of reasons for that growth–the corporate tax cut caused all businesses to grow and the elimination of a lot of government regulation gave small and large businesses freedom to grow. The elimination of red tape took some of the load off of businessmen trying to start or grow a business. Unfortunately, the Biden administration seems to be blindly determined to undo anything the Trump administration did regardless of whether or not the Trump policies actually helped Americans and the American economy.

Yesterday The Washington Times posted an article about the Biden administration’s plans for businesses in America.

The article reports:

President Biden accelerated the regulatory state on his first day in office by ordering agencies to consider aspirational but vaguely defined goals and benefits when imposing new rules on businesses large and small.

The order greenlighting regulations even when the benefits “are difficult or impossible to quantify” sent shudders down the spines of CEOs. They fear business growth will be smothered in pursuit of vague objectives such as “human dignity” and “the interests of future generations.”

“It is the most aggressive thing I’ve ever seen by an administration,” said Doug Holtz-Eakin, president of the American Action Forum, a right-leaning economic think tank. “It’s one thing to put out a bunch of regulations, but this changes the way regulation is done. It allows you to jam through any regulation you want regardless of the impact [on] the private sector.”

The order, which tosses out the government’s traditional cost-benefit analysis before approving a regulation, is among a slew of executive actions Mr. Biden has signed to curb the power of businesses.

Mr. Biden‘s regulations provide a road map for his plans to transform business and what he sees as anti-competitive business practices. Without the regulations, Mr. Biden said, businesses can stifle competition, raise prices and limit consumer choice. The regulations are also designed to give workers more power to demand higher wages and mobility, the president has said.

The article concludes with an example:

Mr. Holtz-Eakin sees it differently. He said the red tape combined with the administration’s rhetoric has created a “negative business environment.” He views Mr. Biden‘s talk and actions as a two-pronged approach to getting business to bend to the administration’s will.

Last month, Mr. Biden‘s agriculture secretary and top economic adviser accused the meat industry of illegal price-fixing and blamed it for soaring food prices. They vowed to investigate and restrict the industry in the name of protecting consumers.

An industry trade group accused the administration of scapegoating meat producers. It said the prices increased because of a nationwide labor shortage.

“I think that was relatively unprecedented,” Mr. Holtz-Eakin (Doug Holtz-Eakin, president of the American Action Forum) said of the attack on the meat industry. “There have been other industries singled out by presidents, but that one was a surprise.”

What we need to be aware of is the fact that the Biden administration is moving us away from private enterprise to government control of businesses. It’s not a good direction to be headed. The only solution to this is to elect conservatives to Congress in 2022 and elect either President Trump of Governor DeSantis as President in 2024. Otherwise we will probably be a socialist country within five years.