When a Republican lawmaker in 2011 asked an Obama administration Office of Management and Budget official to name regulations where costs were not justified by benefits, the official had a ready answer.

“There is only one big one that comes to mind,” said Cass Sunstein, then administrator of the White House OMB’s Office of Information & Regulatory Affairs. “It is called Positive Train Control.”

Even though the regulations for the $13.2 billion rail-safety system were mandated by Congress, “monetizable benefits are lower than the monetizable costs,” Sunstein told then Rep. Sue Myrick, R-N.C., at a House Energy & Commerce subcommittee hearing. “There aren’t a lot like that.”