Attention to Distribution in US Regulatory Analyses
Attention to Distribution in US Regulatory Analyses
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DOI：
10.1093/reep/rew011
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发表时间：
2016-06-01
影响因子：
5.4
通讯作者：
Zeckhauser, Richard J.
中科院分区：
文献类型：
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作者：
Robinson, Lisa A.;Hammitt, James K.;Zeckhauser, Richard J.
在颁布一项重要的环境、健康或安全法规之前，美国政府机构通常会分析其影响的分布以及总成本和收益。我们回顾了几项监管分析，以确定这一期望是否得到满足。我们发现，机构的分析提供的信息很少分配的影响。他们往往只注意到，该条例不会对儿童、少数民族或低收入群体的健康产生不利影响。这种对分配缺乏关注可能是哲学上的，监管机构认为，只要这些群体的健康不受损害，他们就应该选择净利益最大化的选项。它也可能是出于务实的原因，包括对政治和法律的影响的关注;分配影响很小的假设;或数据，时间和资源限制。我们认为，这种关注与健康有关的损失的可能性，以及缺乏对利益和成本的充分分配的分析，是有问题的。然而，更广泛和严格的分布分析的可行性和可取性仍然不清楚。需要进一步研究，以增加我们对成本和效益分布的了解，并确定要求例行提供此类信息的好处是否超过所需的成本。
Before promulgating a major environmental, health, or safety regulation, US government agencies are generally expected to analyze the distribution of its impacts as well as its total costs and benefits. We review several regulatory analyses to determine whether this expectation is being met. We find that agencies’ analyses provide little information on distributional impacts. Often they note only that the regulation will not adversely affect the health of children, minorities, or low-income groups. This lack of attention to distribution may be philosophical, with regulators believing they should choose the option that maximizes net benefits as long as the health of these groups is not harmed. It may also be motivated by pragmatic reasons, including concerns about political and legal implications; an assumption that distributional impacts are small; or data, time, and resource constraints. We argue that this focus on the possibility of health-related losses, and the lack of analysis of the full distribution of both benefits and costs, is problematic. However, the feasibility and desirability of more extensive and rigorous distributional analysis remains unclear. Further research is needed to increase our understanding of the distribution of both costs and benefits and to determine whether the benefits of requiring routine provision of such information would outweigh the costs entailed.