Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SUNDAY, September 24, 1995 TAG: 9509260027
SECTION: EDITORIAL PAGE: D2 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE:
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
Kermit's song alludes to the difficulties, and counterbalancing advantages, of being a color different from other Muppets. But the puppet frog's lament could as easily apply these days to environmental interest groups trying to hold on to hard-won gains in a Congress pushing for regulatory reform.
We sympathize with their concerns. But we're convinced that, if they poked their heads out of the trenches more often, environmentalists might discover some of their fears about reform are exaggerated and counterproductive.
The overall cost of federal regulatory efforts - the bulk of which is paid by states, localities and businesses - is in the neighborhood of $600 billion a year, and the fastest-growing tab is for environmental protection.
Citing this huge cost is not in itself a persuasive argument for reform. Americans want clean water and clean air. They want stewardship of the land to ensure that its wildlife and vegetation survive to share the Earth with future generations of humans. People generally are willing to pay for what they want.
At these prices, though, the country should be getting the best - and it isn't. The rising cost, moreover, is sure at some point to erode public support for environmental protection. It's as much in environmentalists' as everyone else's interests to make regulation more effective and efficient.
Enter better risk assessment. It could strengthen environmental protection and health and safety measures, and restrain rising costs to boot.
In a recent edition of the journal Issues in Science and Technology, John D. Graham, director of the Center for Risk Analysis at the Harvard School of Public Health, relates the results of a study he and another scientist undertook to examine the cost-effectiveness of 200 national programs aimed at increasing life expectancy.
"Some highly cost-effective programs were not fully implemented, such as childhood immunization against mumps, measles, and rubella. At the same time, other cost-ineffective programs were widely implemented, including rules to reduce minute concentrations of chemicals and radiation in outdoor air, which did little to improve health but imposed significant costs on the private sector."
Unlike many worst-case horror stories on both sides of the regulatory-reform debate, this anecdote illustrates a broad problem in federal regulatory overview: There is no overview. Not in the sense of an organized, systematic method for assessing various risks in relation to each other, and directing resources where they will do the most good.
That there have been benefits from the jumble of regulatory agencies is indisputable. Grumble as they will about taxes, it's doubtful a majority of voters would tolerate a retrenchment from safety and environmental gains. But that doesn't mean government can't produce similar or better gains by doing a much better job of risk assessment in setting priorities, and, yes, cost-benefit analysis in proposing responses.
Mention of the latter sends fear through activists who look to government to mandate solutions to social, health and environmental ills. Government does have a role to play. To produce a better result, though, it should apply more market incentives and set more standards that allow businesses to find the cheapest way of complying. To gain respect from a skeptical public, it also should be able to show that the benefits of its rules are likely worth their cost.
Critics of reform bills in Congress rightly worry that benefits are not as easily quantifiable as costs. But a cost-benefit test can be flexible enough to take intangible values into account.
The eagerness of the Republican Congress to please business lobbies has made regulatory reform seem like an overpaid power elite's conspiracy to spread pollution across the land. But regulation is broken, and needs fixing. It can be vastly improved without breaking what's of value in the process.
by CNB