The Real Cost of Government Overreach

NPGA’s coalition partner, the National Association of Manufacturers (NAM), has released findings from a landmark study showing the real cost of regulatory overreach by the federal government.  According to NAM’s research, the federal regulatory burden is now costing manufacturers $29,100 per employee per year, and that cost rises to $50,100 per employee for small manufacturers. The total cost of complying with federal regulations in 2022 is an estimated $3.079 trillion (in 2023 dollars), an amount equal to 12% of U.S. GDP and greater than the manufacturing sector’s entire economic output. These numbers mean that a small firm with 20 employees bears more than $1 million in annual compliance costs.

Looking at inflation-adjusted numbers, the cost of complying with federal regulations has grown 26% for the manufacturing sector since 2012. The regulatory burden is chilling investment, curtailing our ability to hire new workers and suppressing wage growth across the nation.

You can click here to view an executive summary of the study’s findings.