The Competitive Enterprise Institute (CEI)

The Competitive Enterprise Institute (CEI) is a non-profit think tank with a libertarian perspective, established by political author Fred L. Smith Jr. on March 9, 1984, in Washington, D.C. Its mission is to promote the ideas of limited government, free markets, and personal freedom. CEI addresses various regulatory issues such as business and finance, labor, technology and telecommunications, transportation, food and drug policies, as well as energy and environmental matters, where they have been known to question climate change. Currently, Kent Lassman serves as the President and CEO. In the 2017 Global Go To Think Tank Index Report from the University of Pennsylvania, CEI was ranked 59th out of 90 in the "Top Think Tanks in the United States."

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Economy adds 139,000 jobs in May, labor market growth slows: CEI analysis

1 day ago | cei.org | Ryan Young |Sean Higgins

May added 139,000 jobs to the economy, with the unemployment rate staying unchanged at 4.2 percent. Trump’s policies, namely his mission to shrink the federal government and the implementation of sweeping tariffs, have begun to shake up the labor market. CEI Research Fellow Sean Higgins:“Friday’s jobs report shows that President Trump’s effort to shrink the federal government is finally beginning to take hold. Federal employment was down 22,000 in May and is down 59,000 overall since January.
A Day of Defiance—and Donuts - Competitive Enterprise Institute

2 days ago | cei.org | Iain Murray |Sam Kazman

It’s time to double down on National Donut Day. As Secretary of Health and Human Services Robert F. Kennedy Jr. begins pushing his Make America Healthy Again campaign, we suggest a protest against the idea, growing in our nation’s capital, that we can’t have nice things when it comes to food. National Donut Day, the first Friday in June, began in 1938 to honor the Salvation Army volunteers who fried donuts for troops in World War I.
Coalition urges Commodity Futures Trading Commission cut red tape on prediction markets

3 days ago | cei.org | John Berlau

The Competitive Enterprise Institute today sent a coalition letter to the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) urging it to adopt a policy of permissionless innovation toward the promising growth of prediction markets.
CEI's The Surge: Expert testimony, Spanish blackout, and more

5 days ago | cei.org | Daren Bakst |Jacob Tomasulo

If you are interested in analysis and perspective on current energy and environmental issues, then we encourage you to subscribe to this new publication and special updates. Note: This version of The Surge was released to subscribers on May 30, 2025. Some minor edits have been made.
The week in regulations: Low-moisture human foods and grass promotion

5 days ago | cei.org | Ryan Young

Lots of transportation-related regulatory cleanup this week. Friday alone had 47 proposed rules, most of them to repeal obsolete regulations. Two courts struck down Trump’s Liberation Day tariffs in separate decisions, though they will remain in effect until an appeal is heard. Before that decision, President Trump had announced a 50 percent tariff against Europe, then postponed it. He also announced a 25 percent smartphone tariff.
Life is made of trade

1 week ago | cei.org | Ryan Young

If I hadn’t become an economist, I might have found happiness as an evolutionary biologist. The two ways of thinking have a lot in common. Evolution is design without a designer; so are markets and other spontaneous orders. Over at Liberty Fund’s EconLog blog, I show how trade is one of evolution’s driving forces. Life as we know it is literally made of trade. Cell organelles used to be independent organisms, for example.
Eight energy policies that reduce competition and increase energy prices

1 week ago | cei.org | Daren Bakst

The US Department of Justice’s Anticompetitive Regulations Task Force was accepting comments from the public in part “seeking information about laws and regulations that make it more difficult for businesses to compete effectively, especially in markets that have the greatest impact on American households.” The comment period closed on May 27. One of the identified markets was the energy market.
For the sake of user privacy, keep Google search remedies narrow and germane

1 week ago | cei.org | Jessica Melugin |Ryan Smith

The movement in the Biden and Trump administrations of antitrust officials away from consumer welfare and towards a federal judiciary of active regulation is on full display in the Google search trial. The remedies sought by the current Department of Justice (DOJ) are an unprecedented and unwise ceding of critical business decisions to unelected officials and the judiciary. If imposed, users’ privacy may take the biggest hit.
Trump’s IEEPA tariffs overturned by international court, setting up Congress to reclaim taxing powers: CEI analysis

1 week ago | cei.org | Ryan Young

Last night, the Court of International Trade overturned the tariffs that President Trump implemented under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA). CEI senior economist Ryan Young says it’s time for Congress to back the courts and reclaim tariffing powers as delineated under the Constitution. “The separation of powers is one of America’s founding principles, and it is good to see courts reassert it. Presidential powers have limits.
Report offers trade reform blueprint for Congress - Competitive Enterprise Institute

1 week ago | cei.org | Iain Murray |Kent Lassman |Ryan Young

President Trump’s Liberation Day trade tariff policies are failing, just as economists predicted. What can stop the tariff-imposed pain of higher prices, fewer choices, and risk to businesses and jobs? A new CEI report by Kent Lassman, Ryan Young, and Iain Murray offers Congress a blueprint for reclaiming a say in U.S. trade policy. “A trade war, like all war, destroys,” said Kent Lassman, CEI president and report co-author.