Understanding White House's OIRA [Research Assistant]

Regulatory Policy
Professor Chris Carrigan and Professor Stuart Kasdin
Trachetenberg School of Public Policy and Public Administration
The Project: This research project is aimed at understanding the impact of the White House’s Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs (OIRA) on the regulatory review process. We are analyzing both how OIRA’s preferences shape regulatory outcomes and when the agency is most influential in impacting the content of government regulations submitted by agencies. We will see when OIRA has the biggest impacts on new regulations and when it acts more as a pass-through. The student will also gain a familiarity with the federal legislative and regulatory processes and learn about the available public sources for information on federal regulations and legislation.
Research Assistant Tasks: The student’s work would assist this project by examining the underlying legislation upon which the regulations are based. The student would use legislative data sources and do “content analysis” on the bills, such as word counts of sections of the legislation as part of an estimate for the complexity of the underlying legislation. In addition, he or she might examine the regulatory impact analyses of the regulations to locate and describe the associated benefit-cost estimates.
Time Commitment: 7-9 hours per week
Credit Hour Option: 1
Application Requirement: Send a resume to skasdin@gwu.edu
Contact Email: ccarrigan@email.gwu.edu, skasdin@gwu.edu