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Antitrust Investigations and Policy Towards China: How Biden's Victory Impacts Tech (adweek.com) 61

Posted by EditorDavid from the going-after-Google dept.
Adweek has published an article titled "What to Expect: How a Biden Administration Would Tackle Tech Policy." Some of the highlights: Industry observers have told us they don't expect a change-of-guard to upend the Google lawsuit brought by the Justice Department in concert with 11 state attorneys general over the company's search advertising hegemony. Indeed, we could see a spate of antitrust activity brought to bear on Big Tech during a Biden presidency... "Regardless of who wins the presidential election, antitrust enforcement against Big Tech will continue," said Sally Hubbard, director of enforcement strategy at liberal think tank the Open Markets Institute....

"Biden will take a...tough position on infrastructure companies like Huawei," said Alec Stapp, director of technology policy at the liberal Progressive Policy Institute, but is "less likely to come down hard on consumer apps like TikTok." He expects Biden to talk tough on China, "but with fewer unilateral tariffs and more cooperation from international allies."
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Antitrust Investigations and Policy Towards China: How Biden's Victory Impacts Tech More

Antitrust Investigations and Policy Towards China: How Biden's Victory Impacts Tech

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  • The censorship towards the end of the election was at totalitarian levels. The inability for any potential businesses to get access to credit card processing, hosting services, DDOS and other essential services is scary and I feel will directly continue and become much stronger. I also feel the crackdown on Bitcoin and other decentralized services will continue.

    • I can promise you that they will try and regulate crypto currencies. To a government it is potential tax revenue, as well as a vehicle to avoid reporting certain amounts of income. They will go after it as hard as they finally forced Ebay to report sales transactions and now even charge sales tax even though that usually doest apply to cross-state sales. If the government can figure how how reach deeper into you, they will. You could probably just ask then the results of your last prostate exam so you can

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by whitroth ( 9367 )

        Good. The only reason, other than suckers betting on cryptocurrency the way they would the market, is for tax cheats and criminals.

        You ought to be audited by the IRS.

    • Nobody was censored, quit crying snowflake.

      If you can't get credit card processing it means your credit sucks, that's all. Why can't you afford hosting? Hosting is cheap. Don't DDOS, that's not an essential service. There is no "crackdown on bitcoin," dummy. Bitcoin was never a magical money-laundering-legalization-machine. If you launder money, go to jail. That's not a "crackdown on bitcoin."

      Your life would be a lot happier if you deleted all your apps, cancelled your cable television, and subscribed to a

      • Credit card processing is not the same as credit. It means the ability to access the VISA and Mastercard services, in other words to be able to have someone pay you using a bank card. You must pay a fee for this service and use a processor who is responsible for verification/etc. The shutdown of this began with federal government programs meant to discourage drug and other activities found distasteful, including pornography, weapon purchases, selling of cannibus products (which is why you must use cash f

  • H1-B limits will be removed (Score:5, Insightful)

    by chiguy ( 522222 ) on Sunday November 08, 2020 @02:26PM (#60700030) Homepage

    H1-B limits will be removed or raised. There will be no more enforcement of abuse. American tech wages will remain stagnant.

    Look, Kamala Harris, who is an Indian American from California will become VP. Those are her peeps and she'll protect them. That means there will be much more abuse of the H1-B program and more Americans will be replaced with cheap Indian labor. And if you think I'm unfairly picking on Indians, Indians get 74.5% of H1-Bs, followed by Chinese 11.8%, then Canadians 1.0%. So apparently, 74.5% of global geniuses/tech craftsmen are Indian and 11.8% are Chinese. What are the odds that that's true?

    It's a great win for big tech. I voted for Biden but this is an area of policy I agree with Trump on.

    If you don't like it, write your reps now.

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by Anonymous Coward

      Biden doesn't represent the working class. He represents the academic and executive class. He gives zero fucks about this nation other than how much bribes he can get.

      Biden didn't get the votes because he's Biden. Biden got elected because people dislike Trumps attitude and demeanor. Yet, Americans disavowed policies of socialism. The proof is in the votes. Even AOC is fighting back at the Democrats.

    • Biden has declared that unemployed coal miners can learn to code, so the US has no need for the H1-B program any more.

      But given these COVID times . . . a lot of underemployed folks could also learn to code . . . like, prostitutes, bar workers, cinema workers and etc.

      Now if they actually like it another matter . . .

    • Re:H1-B limits will be removed (Score:4, Insightful)

      by khchung ( 462899 ) on Sunday November 08, 2020 @08:50PM (#60701216) Journal

      And if you think I'm unfairly picking on Indians, Indians get 74.5% of H1-Bs, followed by Chinese 11.8%, then Canadians 1.0%. So apparently, 74.5% of global geniuses/tech craftsmen are Indian and 11.8% are Chinese. What are the odds that that's true?

      You missed out an important point, it is the portion of "global geniuses/tech craftsmen *willing* to go to the US on H1B visa".

      Don't forget that India and China adds up to over 40% of the world's population. Where *else* do you think there are enough tech people *willing to work under H1B conditions* go to the US?

      Europe and Australia? Most won't bother to go to the US under H1B, also population not very large.
      Africa? Good luck finding enough qualified people to matter.
      The rest of Asia? Their population added up to only a fraction of India+China.
      Eastern Europe? Population is just a tiny fraction of India+China.

      Then consider the relatively large portion of population in India working in service industry (including tech), and given the hostility Trump shown towards Chinese, it made perfect sense for Indians to take the majority of the H1B quotas.

      No conspiracy required.

      • The Chinese rich enough to hire am English tutor are actually too rich in China. They are literally bank rolled in American universities by CCP to come back and open new business.

        The truth is that there is a sense of superiority in the West where people think staying in the West is in itself some kind of prize. That is why you have got dumbass and poor people doing everything they can at losing in life but still not moving to a better life in another country. You can live a good life teaching English if you

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by tokul ( 682258 )

      > If you don't like it, write your reps now.

      Or move to Georgia and vote in two GOPs. Although some of those GOPs were idiots, who caused second round in election by going after same position in Senate.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by chiguy ( 522222 )

        I'm not a single-issue voter. I disagree with Republicans on most things and would not want 200 more Republican judges. But the abuse of the H1-B program by big tech affects our kids. Instead of hiring and training Americans, they hire and train Indian and Chinese workers who will then spread their knowledge to other Indian and Chinese workers competing against American kids.

    • There are plenty of legit things to hit Harris with, why do you have to make up stuff? Do you have any evidence of her feeling more strongly about Indians than Americans?

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by chiguy ( 522222 )

        Yes. A quick google of kamala harris h1-b will do that. That's fewer high quality jobs for American tech workers. Just like opening development hubs in India and China and doing knowledge transfer, they're selling out American college grads.

        They're also reinstating allowing spouse employment visas. So for every H1-B approved, there are 2 American jobs being competed for in America, driving down worker wages. Great for company owners. Not great for American workers. And for those who are sobbing for the big

        • That's all fine and good, but that doesn't mean she wants to protect Indians over Americans. It means she serves the corporate class over the worker class.

          • Re: (Score:2)

            by chiguy ( 522222 )

            That's all fine and good, but that doesn't mean she wants to protect Indians over Americans. It means she serves the corporate class over the worker class.

            I'll grant you that it's hard to disentangle motivations, but I'd suggest that she'd be less motivated if 70% of H1-Bs came from Iraq. Or even Taiwan. But who knows

            • Nobody knows, so don't make stuff up :) If companies wanted cheap workers, they'd likely take them from any country all the same if they get the job done.

  • My guess is that most of Trump's policies will be reverted by the new administration, and for good reasons [imgur.com]. But one that's likely to stick is the stance on China, ending its preferential status.

    • Re: (Score:3)

      by chiguy ( 522222 )

      Your number means you're pretty old :)

      I guess I'll be surprised if Biden sticks with the hard stance on China. It's a big market and ever since Clinton, corporate greed has taken over the Democratic party.

      "President Clinton Thursday reversed course on China and renewed its trade privileges despite what he said was Beijing's lack of significant progress on human rights.

      Echoing the case made by George Bush when he was president, Clinton said he was convinced the Chinese would take more steps to improve human

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by dargaud ( 518470 )

        Your number means you're pretty old :)

        Could be better. I mean worse (been on usenet since '86!). As I've been reading /. since day one, but I was a lurker and only registered the first time I decided to post. And we apparently did it only a day or so apart...

  • Americans are freaking out on new competitor (Score:4, Insightful)

    by hackingbear ( 988354 ) on Sunday November 08, 2020 @02:50PM (#60700106)

    "Biden will take a...tough position on infrastructure companies like Huawei," said Alec Stapp, director of technology policy at the liberal Progressive Policy Institute, but is "less likely to come down hard on consumer apps like TikTok." He expects Biden to talk tough on China, "but with fewer unilateral tariffs and more cooperation from international allies."

    This just proves that the US is freaking out at any new competitors [iplytics.com] (*), rather than the pretense of "national security" and "IP protection".

    It may look like a powerful strike now. By cutting off supplies of American semiconductors and other high tech products, he effectively removes the biggest advantage of American hi-tech products -- the first mover advantage [investopedia.com] -- and forces Chinese companies, who otherwise have imported billions of semiconductors [reuters.com] and intellectual properties [mondaq.com] (**), to develop and use domestic products even if those are inferior. In a few years, their domestic products will then be able to survive in the market, improve and eventually surpass the American competitor.

    (*)

    The counts of 5G declarations with a priority date after 2012 show a leading position for Huawei

    Again, Huawei declared the largest UE relevant 5G portfolio and the order of rank looks very similar to the overall declared number of 5G patent families.

    (**) Just like you were unlikely to read about the massive exporting of US agriculture goods to China before the trade war, you probably are not informed by your media outlets that China is import hundreds of billions worth of semiconductors and IPs.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by chiguy ( 522222 )

      The US had a $576B trade deficit with China in 2019. They import the IP, copy it, then export it to other markets competing with the supposed US first-mover advantage. We give it freely to get access to their markets.

      I get the necessity-is-the-mother-of-invention argument. But they do that already. Maybe the protectionism speeds that development up a bit, but China seems to be perfectly capable of importing US IP while simultaneously developing their own. Also look at India's development in IT. They have bi

  • He didn't reign in the banks.... (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Tangential ( 266113 ) on Sunday November 08, 2020 @03:31PM (#60700204) Homepage
    Biden was part of an administration that did exactly zero to lessen the hold that the "too big to fail" banks had on the US. None of them were broken up into smaller entities and to view the constraints put on them as significant is a fairy tale. The real push during his tenure as VP was to make the big banks bigger and to give them more power...not less. They are still far too big to fail and still have the US by the short hairs.

    The tech companies have done nothing to impede his candidacy and I would also presume that they have made significant contributions (both in $ and in 'editorial' control to his campaign.) Its foolish to expect him to reign them in unless they start really, really interfering with his party's plans. That would be like expecting him to crack down on trade inequities with China. Isn't gonna happen.
    • They did nothing and person they had Investigate the banks as AG, turned around after office to work for Lobbying firms that lobby on behalf of the SAME BANKS he was investigating.

    • None of them were broken up into smaller entities

      Because this is largely a fairy tail solution that does nothing to fix the underlying problems in the industry.

      Here's what breaking up too big to fail means:
      Step 1. Future (smaller) banks continue to do what lead to the financial crisis.
      Step 2. Future (smaller) banks get into financial strife.
      Step 3. The government now lets these smaller banks fail.
      Step 4. People lose money. People lose jobs.

      An alternate view of the term "too big to fail" is to call it "something we don't want to lose". If GM were 3 smaller

  • The weird thing about this election is that Biden's policies didn't really matter. Is he going to push us toward a new world where tech companies are broken up or are we headed toward another laissez faire period like we had under Obama?

    That... just doesn't really matter. We all believe what we want, the point is that Biden is likely to implement policy in a predictable and classically conservative manner (slow change) rather than the disruptive and radical change we've had under Trump. And, I think that'

  • Biden is not victorious in this election.

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