Ironically this statement glosses over the indisputable issue of the specifics of the paperwork volume, and the change in it over time. "Regulations exist everywhere" is far to general an argument to be meaningful in my opinion. Humans are forever limited by time and their labor capacity within it.

Regulation is where protectionism and corruption manifest.

Regulation is a tool that can be used for many ends. It's not very helpful to speak about them collectively.

But they obviously aren't the exact same set of regulations everywhere.

Measuring burdensomeness of regulation by number of laws is an incredibly poor measure. Though I'd still be surprised if many countries healthcare laws were as complex as our own.

For example

All doctors require 1 year of schooling 2 year 5 years 10 years 20 years.

Each is 1 law but has each also has very different level of burdensomeness.