Environmental Regulations Don't Kill Jobs

Washington D.C. - Anyone who tells you “environmental regulations kill jobs and hurt businesses” is at worst a liar and at best severely misinformed and there are documents to prove it.

Those who pay attention to politics, especially when it comes to regulation, knows the all-too-familiar rhetoric. After a regulation is proposed, usually by a Democrat, the Republicans moan and gnash their teeth about how it's going to destroy industries and put the country deeper into debt. While companies tell this to Republicans they are saying something completely different to their investors and financial regulators.

The Associated Press released an article in which two companies: DTEEnergy and FMC Corporation told Republican lawmakers what they want to hear regardless of the facts.

DTE Energy said on April 15^th to a House committee “Without the right policy, we could be headed for disaster.” In reality they don't know what effect it will have, saying to their investors it was “reviewing potential impacts of the proposed and recently finalized rules, but is not able to quantify the financial impact ... at this time." DTE environmental issues vice-president Skiles Boyd later said the testimony was meant to state the potential economic hardship on customers and the SEC report focused on the company's financial condition. Page 52 of the report (available if requested) states “We are subject to extensive environmental regulation. Additional costs may result as the effects of various substances on the environment are studied and governmental regulations are developed and implemented. Actual costs to comply could vary substantially. We expect to continue recovering environmental costs related to utility operations through rates charged to our customers.” In other words they will pass on the cost to the customer, but will not kill businesses or jobs.

FMC Corp's Jim Pearce, when called to a House hearing in February of 2010, said “The current U.S. approach to regulating greenhouse gases ... will lead U.S. natural soda ash producers to lose significant business to our offshore rivals...." Soda ash is used to produce glass, and is a major component of the company's business.” Just 13 days later in its SEC filings however the company said it was "premature to make any estimate of the costs of complying with unenacted federal climate change legislation, or as yet unimplemented federal regulations in the United States.

It continues to state (Note: Signing up is required to see the exact text, though I can email the document if requested) “At this point our U.S. facilities are not subject to any state or regional greenhouse gas regulation, and our foreign operations outside of Europe and Canada are not subject to national or local greenhouse gas regulation. Although some of our European and Canadian operations may be subject to greenhouse gas regulation, the cost to these facilities has not been and is not expected to be significant, and effect of European Union and Canadian greenhouse gas regulation has not been and is not expected to be material to FMC. We have considered the potential physical risks to FMC facilities and operations and the indirect consequences of regulation or business trends as a result of potential future climate change. Because of the many variables, not only with respect to the science, but also with respect to the nature and effect of future global climate change regulation itself, it is impossible to predict in any meaningful.”

However the truth isn't stopping the Republicans from touting their lies. Using the continued meme they plan to attack the President Barack Obama, the Democratic Party, and the Environmental Protection Agency. They are also holding hearings and trying to pass several bills to stop environmental regulation from passing. None have passed the Senate. The Obama Administration doesn't help matters any when it postpones the regulations under the guise of “looking at them”, after which they silently throw it away or “give it up” in exchange for another proposal.

Thankfully not all of the Democrats break so easily. Henry Waxman, one of California's Representatives, said of the SEC filings they “show that the anti-regulation rhetoric in Washington is political hot air with little or no connection to reality." California Senator Barbra Boxer said about the bills “I will see to it, to the best of my ability, to try to stop everything...Republicans will lose seats over this.”

Thankfully some people in Washington are paying attention to not just what the businesses are saying but what they're putting in their economic reports as well. Otherwise we'd just have a bunch of people listening to and believing what is being told by them and nobody doing any fact-checking.