Move over gaslighting, the FTC has its own word of the year
FTC’s word of the year—commercial surveillance
Will, Aubrey, and I filed comments in the Federal Trade Commission's ANPRM on commercial surveillance and data security. We are mere human beings, so we did not answer all 95 questions, instead focusing on the questions we at the CGO felt uniquely qualified to answer.
Like others, we heartily cautioned the FTC against proceeding on this issue, recommending that Congress is best able to take the lead on consumer privacy protections. We got into the weeds on the assumptions baked into the phrase "commercial surveillance;" what the research says about consumer behavior regarding privacy trade-offs; issues of competition and privacy; and what the FTC should consider on the teens and children privacy question.
You can read the executive summary and full filing here.
We published a Benchmark piece that pulls out Will's cost of privacy legislation literature review that's in the appendix of the FTC comment. It is a compendium of cost estimates for domestic and European data regulations—a reminder that regulations have trade-offs, costs and benefits.
Abundance on C-SPAN
Will appeared on C-SPAN's Washington Journal to do a deep dive into our abundance agenda work, specifically our abundance poll and policy recommendations. He summarizes well why and how American can boost its economy through targeted policy fixes, the attitudes Americans have toward the future, the safety vs. innovation trade-offs, and much more. Stick around for the phone calls!
$10B and not a $1 left for R&D
Finally, Eli Dourado has an eye-popping article about the dozen American universities with over $10 billion endowments each, yet how little of that money is actually used for research. Harvard alone has a $41 billion endowment and spent less than 1% of it on research with most of the research funds coming from the federal government. Clearly there's an opportunity here for promoting innovation, and Eli explores what might be done.
Keeping my day job
I am honored to be the Beacon Center of Tennessee's new Senior Fellow for Technology and Innovation. While I'm keeping my day job at the CGO I am looking forward to working on tech with the excellent team at Beacon in the booming state of TN. In a short discussion about the new role, I talk with Ron Shultis about what motivates me when it comes to innovation policy as well as their work in Tennessee—watch the short interview here.