I read an article in The Economist last week titled “United States’ economy: Over-regulated America” that nicely articulated how I often feel when I hear or read about new laws.  Namely, that things are becoming over-complicated and in the process sometimes hurting more than they help.

There seems to be an overall trend of trying to make sure that a regulation accounts for every possible outcome of a process.  This is never going to happen, no matter how hard people try. 

Every single thing cannot be accounted for, and in trying to do so, the law becomes so complex that no one can understand it.  And let’s face it, if someone wants to find a loop hole for a particular regulation, they’re going to find it. 

So now you have a law that is so complex that it’s hard to tell if someone is actually in violation of it in the first place. 

In some cases, laws meant to help can actually be detrimental. 

The Sarbanes-Oxley law set new standards for public company boards, their management and public accounting firms.  The law is supposed to help prevent fraud, but it has made it so difficult to become a publicly traded entity that America’s share of initial public offerings (IPOs) fell from 67% in 2002 to 16% in 2011. 

This is not good news for an economy that is still on shaky ground.  That isn’t to say that some sort of law shouldn’t be in place, but maybe we need one with less red tape.

Another example is health-care reform. 

There are (in my opinion) many potential benefits in this law.  However, one of the unintended consequences is the increase in the number of categories of injuries and illnesses that hospitals must use to bill insurance companies for reimbursement.  The number is growing from 18,000 to 140,000, including “…nine codes relating to injuries caused by parrots, and three relating to burns from flaming water-skis.” I would love to know the story behind that one. 

Look, I don’t know much about health care except that it seems like it needs some major reform.  And making things even more complex and time-consuming than they already are doesn’t seem to be the way to achieve that.  Again, a good idea, but one that seems to have gotten mired down in the details. 

I think all of these enormous, nearly impossible to understand laws come from a good place.  They just get bogged down in the process. 

Perhaps we need to pass a law requiring the simplification of laws.  Wait a minute…

In the US, national emission standards for hazardous air pollutants (NESHAP) have been established for industries emitting toxic air emissions that require the use of Maximum Achievable Control Technology (MACT) for compliance.

Mercury NESHAP/MACT standards have been published for hazardous and municipal waste incineration, commercial/industrial boilers, chlor-alkali plants, and Portland cement kilns. Strategies for controlling mercury and other toxic air pollutants include pollution prevention measures, including product substitution, process modification, work-practice standards and materials separation; coal cleaning (relevant to mercury control); flue gas treatment technologies; and others.

More than 20 years after Congress passed the 1990 Clean Air Act Amendments, the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) on December 21, 2011, issued the first national standards for mercury pollution from power plants ̶ the Mercury and Air Toxics Standards (MATS).

The 1990 Clean Air Act Amendments required the stricter standards on power plants in an effort to reduce toxic emissions across the country. These new rules finalize standards to reduce air pollution from coal and oil-fired power plants under sections 111 (new source performance standards) and 112 (toxics program) of the 1990 Clean Air Act Amendments.

Power plants are the largest source of air pollution from mercury, arsenic and cyanide, and are responsible for half the mercury and over 75 percent of the acid gas emissions in the United States.

Mercury has been shown to harm the nervous system of children exposed in the womb, thereby causing impaired thinking, learning and early development. According to the EPA, the standards will prevent 130,000 cases of childhood asthma symptoms and about 6,300 fewer cases of acute bronchitis among children each year.

Today, more than half of all coal-fired power plants already use pollution control technologies that will help them meet these standards. Once finalized, these standards will ensure the remaining plants – about 40 percent of all coal-fired power plants – take similar steps to decrease these hazardous pollutants.

In addition to reducing emissions of mercury and other toxic air pollutants, the controls needed to meet the standards will result in reduced emissions of sulfur dioxide and fine particles, which will lower airborne soot levels throughout the United States.

Under these standards, the EPA is providing the standard three years for compliance, but is also encouraging permitting authorities to make a fourth year available for technology installations. If still more time is needed, they will provide a pathway to address any localized electric reliability problems, should they arise.

Among the improvements that will result, it is estimated there will be approximately 540,000 missed work or “sick” days avoided each year, enhancing productivity and lowering health care costs, and 3,200,000 fewer Restricted Activity days.

People exposed to toxic air pollutants at sufficient concentrations and durations may have an increased chance of getting cancer or experiencing other serious adverse health effects. These health effects can include disruption to the immune system, as well as neurological, reproductive, developmental, respiratory and other health problems. In addition to exposure from breathing air toxics, some toxic air pollutants such as mercury can deposit onto soils or surface waters. They are then taken up by plants and ingested by animals and are eventually magnified up through the food chain.

The Mercury and Air Toxics Standards, combined with the final Cross State Air Pollution Rule issued in 2011, are estimated to prevent up to 46,000 premature deaths, 540,000 asthma attacks among children, and 24,500 emergency room visits and hospital admissions. The two programs are estimated to provide a total of up to $380 billion in return to American families in the form of longer, healthier lives and reduced health care costs.

How many people reading this have already checked Facebook today? Its allure is strong. 

It’s a one-stop shop where one can reconnect with old friends, make new friends, play games, join like-minded groups, read the news…the list goes on and on.  Well, soon you will have the chance to own your very own piece of that addictive pie. 

Facebook filed its Initial Public Offering (IPO) with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) earlier this month to become a publicly traded and owned entity. 

In a letter to potential shareholders CEO Mark Zuckerberg said, “We’re going public for our employees and our investors.  We made a commitment to them when we gave them equity that we’d work hard to make it worth a lot and make it liquid, and this IPO is fulfilling our commitment.  As we become a public company, we’re making a similar commitment to our new investors and we will work just as hard to fulfill it.” 

Facebook generated $3.7 billion in revenue in 2011, and could be valued between $75 and $100 billion when it goes public.

An article in The Economist titled Facebook: A fistful of dollars warns that Facebook faces a couple of issues that may give investors pause. 

One is how the company will continue to operate with the same level of urgency with employees who will suddenly become “paper millionaires” when the stock goes public. 

The second is an issue with a broader scope and the potential for regulatory backlash.

Facebook knows a lot about its users.  And it is constantly working on ways to find out more.  The idea being that the more it knows, the better it can cater to its users' specific wants and needs.  This is a nebulous area for many people. 

It’s also an area that is hard to regulate, which could cause problems for the company down the road.  The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) has already sentenced Facebook to twenty years of twice-yearly privacy audits and has required that Facebook get consent from its users before sharing their information. 

This results from a two-year investigation into Facebook for “unfair and deceptive business practices,” including promising users that it would not share their personal information with advertisers (it did) and representing third-party apps as having access to only user information they needed to operate when the apps could actually access nearly all of the users’ personal data, even when they didn’t need it to operate the app.

Basically, Facebook’s greatest asset also has the potential to be its greatest downfall.

Facebook is free (Their slogan: “It’s free and always will be.”), so profits have always come from display ads—chosen based on a specific user’s information to be most of interest to them. 

If Facebook violates its users' trust, it risks losing access to their information as well as any potential buying power they may bring with them. I’m sure that many people and companies will watch with interest as this process proceeds.