Junjie Guo and Ananth Seshadri
Executive Summary:
- A series of Acts and Executive Orders under Governor Walker limit the ability of state
agencies in Wisconsin to promulgate administrative rules, including- Act 21 and Executive Order #50 in 2011. In particular, Act 21 limits agencies
to only passing standards or regulations that are explicitly permitted or required
under state law - Acts 39 and 57 in 2017. Known as the REINS Act, Act 57 requires state legislative
authorization of administrative rules that carry compliance and implementation
costs of $10 million or more over a two-year period
- Act 21 and Executive Order #50 in 2011. In particular, Act 21 limits agencies
- Using data from the Wisconsin Administrative Register, we find
- a significant drop in the number of approved rules since 2011
- no significant change around 2017 in either the number of proposed rules or the
number of approved rules
- The insignificant change around 2017 could be a result of two opposite effects of the
REINS Act that we will investigate in the future- A decrease in the number of administrative rules that cost $10 million or more
over a two-year period - An increase in the number of administrative rules that cost less than $10 million
over a two-year period, which could happen if state agencies split some high cost
rules into multiple low-cost rules to avoid legislative authorization
- A decrease in the number of administrative rules that cost $10 million or more