Klein: US environmental reviews average 3.5 to 4.5 years
Ezra Klein · The Great Tariff Debate with David Sacks, Larry Summers, and Ezra Klein · Apr 11, 2025 · at 1:41:26
Ezra Klein highlights regulatory bottlenecks facing energy and infrastructure projects while discussing permitting reforms in the CHIPS Act.
0:00 / 0:03exact quote · 3.2s
▶ Watch the full episode on YouTube → 720p mp4 · rendered on demand · StarZero watermark
“Environmental review, which now take on average three and a half to four and a half years.”
quote is from the automated transcript, cleaned for reading: filler sounds and stutters are removed, nothing is rephrased. names can be misheard (the analysis reads context, assessments check outside sources). how →
More from Ezra Klein
Klein: Trump administration publicly shook down NYC Mayor Eric Adams
“They shook down Eric Adams. That's my, that's a direct accusation that happened in public. They shook down Eric. They shook down Eric Adams because they could put him in his pocket.”
Ezra Klein: DOGE is a hack-and-slash operation destroying state capacity
“Doge to me is a It would be great if somebody tried it, but I see this as much more of a destruction of state capacity and a hack and slash operation.”
Klein: Democrats tend to subsidize demand while choking supply
“My book Abundance with Derek Thompson is about the tendency Democrats have to subsidize things where they are choking off the supply of the thing they want people to have more of.”
Klein: Subsidized housing in California costs 4.4x Texas rates
“And the cost of creating housing in California market rate is two X in California, what it is in Texas. But when you get into that publicly subsidized housing, where you have all these new standards and rules and regulations being triggered by the addition of …”
Klein: Sound policies do not require constantly shifting defense arguments
“Usually when an idea is good, you don't need people jumping back and forth on it so often, going between these tariffs are a bad idea, but they're a smart negotiating ploy, to these tariffs plus are an actually great idea, and you should all calm down.”