America’s smallest firms bear the largest per employee burden of federal regulatory compliance costs, according to a study released by the Office of Advocacy of the U.S. Small Business Administration. Firms with fewer than 20 employees annually spend $7,647 per employee to comply with federal regulations, compared with the $5,282 spent by firms with more than 500 employees.
Among its other findings, the report also shows that the annual cost of federal regulations in the United States totaled $1.1 trillion in 2004.