Crawford votes to Reduce Red Tape and Grow the Economy

Today, Congressman Rick Crawford voted to reduce excessive red tape and other bureaucratic burdens that prevent small business owners from hiring new workers and growing the economy. The Red Tape Reduction and Small Business Job Creation Act (H.R. 4078) passed the House of Representatives today and now awaits action from the Senate.

“Nothing kills a job or stifles our economic recovery more than a Washington regulation. Today the House took action to get Washington bureaucrats off the backs of small business owners,” said Crawford. “Regulations from the Obama Administration are deterring small business owners from hiring workers and growing the economy. The President’s own Small Business Administration has said that small businesses across the country face annual regulatory costs of over $10,000 per employee. With the vote today in the House, small business owners will see regulatory relief.”

Since taking office, the Obama administration has had under review more than 400 regulations classified as economically significant. A regulation is classified as economically significant if the proposed regulation will have an annual impact on the economy of $100 million or more.

The Red Tape Reduction and Small Business Job Creation Act (H.R. 4078) would impose a moratorium on any new economically significant regulation until unemployment drops below six percent nationally, which will save at least $22.1 billion and thousands of jobs. The legislation would also prohibit “lame duck” administrations from issuing economically significant regulations. Under this legislation the Securities and Exchange Commission and Commodity Futures Trading Commission would be required to conduct more detailed cost-benefit analyses on proposed regulations.

According to the Small Business Administration (SBA) small businesses have created 64 percent of all new jobs in the past 15 years and face an annual regulatory cost of $10,585 per employee, which is 36 percent higher than the regulatory cost facing large firms. The SBA estimated in a 2010 report that the total regulatory costs amount to $1.75 trillion annually, which would be enough money for businesses to provide 35 million private sector jobs with an average salary of $50,000.