
DC faces Silicon Valley's riches and ever-growing power - electic
https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2016/apr/17/zuckerberg-trump-silicon-valley-power-gilded-age
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eli_gottlieb
I feel like these kinds of Valley-flattering articles can only continue as
long as the Department of Justice and Department of Labor continue to enforce
antitrust and labor laws leniently. Google and Facebook are monopolies, Uber's
profit margins shrink whenever the drivers decide to stick up for themselves
and demand legal rights and status as employees, and a who's-who list of tech
companies have been declared guilty in court of colluding to suppress
engineers' salaries and bargaining power.

I look forward to seeing the interesting technologies the tech sector will
concoct and market when the strong arm of the law finally forces it to
_concoct and market technologies_ rather than collecting monopoly rents or
exploiting disadvantaged labor.

[http://thebaffler.com/videos/graeber-
thiel#.VxPmqyZyhyQ](http://thebaffler.com/videos/graeber-thiel#.VxPmqyZyhyQ)

~~~
kenshaw
Are you advocating making the US government larger in order to force the US
private sector to shrink?

~~~
eli_gottlieb
Heretical though it may be, _yes_ , I am in fact suggesting that the US
government enforce its existing competition laws, which are already on the
books, in order to force a few megacorps down to a size where they will be
subject to fair market competition and will have to come up with a business
model besides monopoly rent.

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russell
This article seemed rather inane to me, complaining about Cook's standing up
for privacy and Zuckerberg's anti-Trump speech or his new foundation, while
ignoring the $900 million that the Koch brothers are pouring into down-ticket
campaigns or hundreds of millions more from Sheldon Adelson. Somehow the
emphasis on political influence got misplaced.

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cmarschner
Remarkably, as American, Russian, and Chinese Entrepreneurs amass these giant
amounts of wealth, Europe is largely left out and remains more of a middle
class society. Will this in the long run be beneficial or not?

~~~
yummyfajitas
People in America, India and China are pushing technology forward. We've
gotten GOOG/FB/Uber/Tesla from the US; WeChat/WePay/mobile stuff + Shenzen
ecosystem from China; Infosys, Oyo (and hopefully smart cities) from India,
etc.

Imagine what we might have gotten from Europe if they weren't held back by
bureaucracy, fear of failure, egalitarianism, and whatever else prevents
Europe from competing with the valley. (It's certainly not a lack of smart
people - see all the Europeans who do well in the Valley.)

It's hard to see how holding Europe back could possibly be beneficial (of
course I'm not a mercantilist).

~~~
exwardna
Can you expand a bit on the bureaucracy in Europe? Do you think it's hard to
create a limited responsibility company in Europe? Is it better in China?

~~~
CM30
Have you seen that law about taxes for ecommerce in Europe? In the US, the
shop collects tax for the country the shop is based in. In Europe, the shop
has to pay taxes related to the country the people buying the products are in.
This significantly increases the complexity of running an ecommerce business
in Europe.

[https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/vat-supplying-
dig...](https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/vat-supplying-digital-
services-to-private-consumers/vat-businesses-supplying-digital-services-to-
private-consumers#eu-vat-rule-change)

It was an idea with some logic behind it, but it basically cripples European
internet businesses compared to US ones by making taxes that much complicated
to calculate.

~~~
eli_gottlieb
> In the US, the shop collects tax for the country the shop is based in.

Legally, Americans are obligated to pay sales tax for internet purchases in
the state where we live. There's a form for it, every year.

The American move is to shift the burden of tax collection _onto the customer_
, thus ensuring that the taxes are evaded rather than paid. I don't really see
moving bureaucracy onto customers rather than businesses - thus increasing the
total amount of records that must be kept and paperwork that must be filed to
abide perfectly by the law and pay one's taxes - as a _good_ thing.

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forgetsusername
> _Mark Zuckerberg and Tim Cook wield influence comparable to that of Andrew
> Carnegie and John Rockefeller_

Can anyone point to any influence these people are _actually_ having on
American politics?

I mean, according to the tinfoil hat brigade, the Rockefellers are behind
every second conspiracy on the planet. How will these other obscenely rich
folk get a pass? I think the political tides have already shifted. The 1% are
the 1%, regardless of whether we think iPhones are cool. I'll bet on Tim Cook
and Mark Zuckerberg having less influence going forward.

~~~
ethbro
That's the tragedy of Citizens United. They would have less influence if they
couldn't turn dollars into votes.

Unfortunately, they can, and so a few billion dollars buys a fair amount of
political support.

~~~
yardie
Have you paid any attention to the news lately? The number 1 and number 2
candidates of the republican and democrat parties are small money candidates
that are embarrassing the shit out of both national parties. The GOP golden
boy, Jeb Bush, has had to bow out. Even with a $100mm war chest voters still
weren't buying it.

The only thing CU has done is put into law what everyone kind of already knew.

~~~
ethbro
Trump is a populist running on his party base's concerns after they've been
whipped up for the past decade about how evil everyone else is. And reaping
the long-term consequences of the Southern Strategy of the 1950s/60s
Republican party.

Also, he's #121 on the Forbes 400 richest Americans.

Sanders is funding from small donors, but he's #2 in a two person Democratic
primary race.

I'm not seeing an explanation here that consoles me about money not having an
oversized impact on American democracy.

And "what everyone kind of knew" (but was illegal) is far different from
'explicitly condoned by the Supreme Court.'

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nitwit005
The 'robber barons' had enough power to get the police and national guard
deployed to violently put down strikes and to protect employees working during
strikes. None of these CEOs have anywhere near that kind of influence.

They have lobbied quite a bit, but quite a few of those lobbying efforts have
failed.

~~~
gozur88
In the late 1800s there wasn't any legal support for organized labor.
Companies had the right to simply fire everyone who went on strike. After that
it's just a question of moving squatters off your property, and for that you
go to the police. That's not a question of CEO political influence - the laws
unions needed to survive hadn't been passed yet.

~~~
nitwit005
No, they also got the police to deploy to remove them from public places,
which was clearly protected speech. Violence by their hired security against
employees, clearly illegal, was politely ignored. They rather blatantly
controlled the police in some cases.

~~~
gozur88
Well, sure, if you're going to throw in the qualifier "in some cases" you can
make the case for anything. The _normal_ state of affairs was for the workers
to refuse to leave the factory, illegally, and for the local authorities to
give them a lot of slack, because there were far more workers than owners.
Look at the Homestead Mill strike, for example. The reason the battle itself
and the eventual intervention of state militia was the local cops refused to
do anything.

~~~
nitwit005
My point was that these tech CEOs don't have that kind of influence, and they
don't. End of story.

