US Presidency
1974

Now, I ask Congress for prompt authority to increase maximum penalties for antitrust violations from $ 50,000 to $ 1 million for corporations, and from $ 50,000 to $ 100,000 for individual violators. At the Conference on Inflation we found, I would say, very broad agreement that the Federal Government imposes too many hidden and too many inflationary costs on our economy. As a result, I propose a four-point program aimed at a substantial purging process. Number one, I have ordered the Council on Wage and Price Stability to be the watchdog over inflationary costs of all governmental actions. Two, I ask the Congress to establish a National Commission on Regulatory Reform to undertake a long overdue total reexamination of the independent regulatory agencies. It will be a joint effort by the Congress, the executive branch, and the private sector to identify and eliminate existing Federal rules and regulations that increase costs to the consumer without any good reason in today's economic climate.