EPA's Cost-Benefit Analysis Rule: Too Prescriptive?

The Environmental Protection Agency has proposed a new Benefit Cost Rule that would require a cost-benefit analysis of all new “economically significant” regulations, use of scientific best practices in evaluating new rules, more transparency in the description of costs and benefits, and more detailed assessments of how well proposed rules would accomplish intended goals.

Cost-benefit analysis has been endorsed by administrations of both parties and long been seen as a way to improve the regulatory process through providing objective analysis before new rules are implemented.

Some argue this is merely a procedural rule to standardize and add transparency to the existing cost-benefit analysis process. But others believe the rule could limit the EPA’s flexibility in proposing and implementing new regulations. And while previous administrations have focused on “what” can be considered in a cost-benefit analysis, this new rule appears to focus more on “how” that analysis occurs. Is there a middle ground that could make the EPA more effective and efficient?

Join BPC and a panel of experts for a robust conversation on the proposed rule and where we go from here.

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Featured Participants

Joseph Aldy
Professor of the Practice of Public Policy, Harvard Kennedy School; Former Special Assistant to the President for Energy and Environment under President Barack Obama
@josephaldy

John D. Graham
Professor and Former Dean, Indiana University’s School of Public and Environmental Affairs; Former Administrator of the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs under President George W. Bush
@SPEA_DeanGraham

Moderated by:

Tim Doyle
Senior Policy Advisor, BPC

In light of restrictions related to the COVID-19 pandemic, BPC events have shifted to all remote formats, such as video teleconferences or calls.