
Why Is America So Far Behind Europe on Digital Privacy? - pseudolus
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/06/08/opinion/sunday/privacy-congress-facebook-google.html
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tootahe45
When you have zero tech companies it's easier to do things that impede tech
companies.

~~~
Barrin92
Given that the productivity per capita in France or Germany is maybe 10% lower
than in the US, and that those are highly developed countries with centuries
of industrial knowledge, you might want to adjust your definition of "tech
company" a bit, because if those countries had no technology firms, they'd be
quite a lot poorer.

The US has incredibly strong advantages in fields like the semi-conductor
industry, but in transportation, pharmaceuticals and aerospace Europe is quite
strong. And when you look at hidden champions and the integration of
technology into small and medium sized firms, the US heartland has a big
problem.

~~~
Gpetrium
Some may argue that to remain competitive in today's environment, some tech
companies require a diminished amount of customer privacy, otherwise their
foreign rivals will be able to do more and be more successful in the long run.

For the EU, if there is a belief that their tech companies can't out-compete
against foreign rivals (Think search engine, social media, cyber sec, etc) and
that their data could be used against them in the near future, it may seem
intuitive to put privacy checkers to get foreign entities in line with your
interests.

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ThenAsNow
The word "Digital" could be eliminated from the headline without loss of
accuracy.

~~~
TazeTSchnitzel
The Data Protection Directive and GDPR don't care about whether the privacy
violation involves a computer :)

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umanwizard
The US is behind Western and Northern Europe in almost every facet of
development that I can think of, except for GDP per capita. Education,
healthcare, social mobility, political culture, news media seriousness, public
infrastructure, etc.

The US is also shockingly institutionally paralyzed and unable to make
meaningful reforms in any area, even if they are very popular with the
majority of voters. The last one I can think of was ObamaCare, which was not a
particularly radical change, but _felt_ like it because of how difficult it
was to pass.

It's not particularly interesting to ask "why can't we reform digital privacy
laws" \-- the more interesting general question is "why can't we reform
_anything_ ".

~~~
moroleth
Pretty much. I am rather dumbfounded by some of the political debates I read
in social media by Americans when many of these have been pretty much solved
here in Europe, with respect to healthcare, education, abortion rights, gun
control, etc. E.g. there is living proof that you can keep a country going
with free/subsidized healthcare or education for almost all of its population,
as evidenced by literally every Western country that is not the US, yet this
empirical evidence is brushed away by American detractors with utterly bizarre
arguments about economic freedom that don't have a foothold anywhere else in
the world. I don't know if detractors are being 1) ignorant of living
conditions abroad, 2) not willing to change a system that benefits them
personally, 3) fully aware of how things are elsewhere but reject it for
ideological reasons.

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sunstone
It's because politicians can be more easily influenced with cash in the USA
than in Europe. The US supreme court hasn't done any favors in this regard
either.

~~~
rock_hard
Don’t worry, Europe is just as corrupt as any other place in the world...they
just do it more elegantly

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notacoward
I think it all comes down to uniquely American cult of individualism, in two
distinct streams that separate and then join together. The first is a general
anti-regulatory attitude and distrust of government, assuming that those
things are harmful to individual freedom even when they're anything but. The
second is treating corporations as people. Put those together and you get a
belief that the government shouldn't tie companies' hands with privacy laws.

I'm not here to debate whether those attitudes are right or wrong. That's just
my theory on how they answer $question.

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braythwayt
What if--And I'm just riffing here--what if America doesn't have nearly the
cult of individualism that everybody seems to think it has?

What if America has a strong authoritarian inclination, as seen by its extreme
focus on patriotism and patriarchal style of Christianity?

What if the "Uniquely American cult of individualism" is (a) Something
Americans tell themselves in a "She doth protest too much" attempt to avoid
facing an uncomfortable truth, and also...

What if the "Uniquely American cult of individualism" is (b) Propaganda that
has been thundered by American Media, Advertising, Political Parties, and
especially corporations who use it as a lever for avoiding regulation and
oversight.

Such as with health care, where untold sums of money are spent every year
explaining that Americans have more choice and want more choice and "control."

Or with guns, where again, untold sums of money are spent every year
explaining that Americans want to enforce their own protection from crime.

What if the "Uniquely American cult of individualism" is no more real than the
Marlborough Man?

I too am not saying these are the only explanations, but they seem like
argument that are worth thinking about rather than taking a knee-jerk position
in favour or against.

~~~
notacoward
Interesting thoughts. I think the part that comes closest to my own beliefs is
this:

> (b) Propaganda that has been thundered ... as a lever for avoiding
> regulation and oversight.

I think the belief in individualism is real and sincere. It is also exploited
ruthlessly, sometimes - but not always - by those who are moving in the exact
opposite direction. Where's the authoritarian message in an ad telling you to
be yourself, express yourself, stand out from the crowd, etc.? I don't think
one needs to assume mass deception (including self-deception) to explain
Americans' behavior. While I wouldn't reject your theory outright, in accord
with Occam's Razor I tend to start with the simpler theory until the case for
some other is properly made.

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lightbritefight
The ads deposing you to "be yourself, express yourself, etc" are doing so not
out of any sense of benevolence, but rather to tap into the self image
Americans hold in order to brand themselves as part of your ingroup, to sell
more of their product.

~~~
notacoward
Oh, totally, but that wouldn't work half as well if individualism hadn't
become so fetishized already.

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jandrewrogers
It is a confluence of many independent factors that cut across culture,
economics, history, political structure, and geography. This applies to almost
every comparison of Europe and America.

A key difference is in the default definition of what "privacy" is relative
to. In America, there is a strong notion of privacy from the government but a
much weaker notion of privacy from companies. In Europe, it is the other way
around. In the specific case of _digital_ privacy, you are adding economic
considerations to the equation which just reinforces the existing status quo
on both sides since the America's tech industry is vastly larger than Europe's
and therefore has much greater skin in the game.

The political dynamics are different because (1) Americans don't trust
governments and especially the Federal government, for complex historical
reasons and (2) the majority of legal authority to regulate, tax, etc resides
with the individual States, not the Federal government, so relatively few
things can be implemented "nationally" in the US. If you model individual
States as "countries" conceptually, the political dynamics make a lot more
sense.

~~~
anoncake
> If you model individual States as "countries" conceptually, the political
> dynamics make a lot more sense.

No, not at all. US states being somewhat like countries can't put the USA
behind the EU. EU states _are_ countries.

~~~
jandrewrogers
This distinction isn't nearly a bright line as you think it is, the US is
essentially what happens when an EU-like structure has 200+ years to evolve.
In the US, States have their own constitutions, legislatures, various legal
systems, and almost complete autonomy with narrow exceptions. Around 30% of
them operated autonomously as their own countries at various times. Americans
have almost no contact with the Federal government, only State governments,
and the nature of State governments, laws, and legal systems varies quite
widely across the US because they evolved independently.

As a simple illustration, the US has no national ID because the individual
States have sole authority for managing the identity of their citizens.
Similarly, it is why all contracts denote the State whose legal system has
jurisdiction over interpretation of the contract -- there isn't a meaningful
Federal jurisdiction over such things. This is also why the US Federal
government can't just "pass a law" to do things, what they can actually do is
severely limited by what the States feel like allowing them to do. While the
States don't flex their autonomy very often these days, almost all power in
the US rests with the individual States.

~~~
anoncake
I don't think the line is that bright. AFAIK there are quite a few areas in
which the EU is more centralized than the USA. The relationship between US
states and the federal government does explain certain differences to the EU,
sure. But not if you simplify it to "US states are like souvereign countries"
because so are EU members. EU and USA cannot be different because of something
they have in common.

> This is also why the US Federal government can't just "pass a law" to do
> things

In a way, it can do that by changing the constitution. That requires the
consent of a majority of states, but this is common in federations. The EU
cannot change its "constitution" at all except with the consensus of all
members.

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piyushpr134
Is it because large American cos are lobbying against such rules ?

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beenBoutIT
It's because America invented tech.

~~~
braythwayt
No, that is not it.

If that was the explanation, then we would say that America is behind the rest
of the world on weights and measures because America invented engineering.

And we would say that America is behind the rest of the world on Health Care
because America invented hospitals.

And we would say that America is behind the rest of the world on justice and
incarceration because America invented prisons.

A much simpler explanation is that all these things share the same social and
political forces, and America is different from the rest of these world on all
these things for similar reasons, and those reasons--whatever we may think
they are--are not related to whether America "invented tech" or not.

See also:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20140960](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20140960)

~~~
bobthepanda
America does have a rather extreme case of “not invented here” syndrome; we
rarely consider best practices in other countries as worthy, especially if
that other country is not an Anglosphere one.

In fact, that “America invented tech” comment is a perfect example of that.

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mmsimanga
Wild guess because most of the technology we use is from America (Facebook,
Google, Twitter, ...). Edit: Typing this from Africa least people think I am
American.

~~~
jabbernotty
Facebook and Twitter are social media companies. I don't think they count as
technology companies the way i.e. a company that creates water purifiers and
solar panels and such are a technology company. And those products are made in
many countries other than the USA.

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lone_haxx0r
Why is Europe so far behind the rest of the world (except China, Russia et al)
on digital freedom and freedom of speech?

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NightlyDev
Europe far behind? Europe is the best place in the world when it comes to
freedom of speech, consumer rights and press freedom.

~~~
jakeogh
You can get fined for a dog trick.

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rock_hard
Europe keeps regulating itself to death and america isn’t.

That’s why most modern innovation (Intel, Apple, Google, Facebook, Amazon,
Tesla, SpaceX, Uber, Airbnb, Etc) is coming from the US and not Europe.

If you lived in both continents you would know

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Toine
You could argue that America is unregulating itself to death.

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amelius
The sad part is that platform economies are mostly owned by US companies, and
their internal (inside the platform) markets operate on a global scale. So far
we haven't seen much external regulation here.

~~~
solarkraft
Clearly not enough, but there are laws (NetzDG) for censoring illegal posts in
Germany.

Much more interesting and important, of course, will be regulation on actual
platform mechanisms like vendor lock-in, Apple's non-compete app store
policies and such.

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solarkraft
I think it's a relevant and legitimate thesis that this is in part caused by
the origin of the major data capitalists (please explain why they are voted
down).

I think it is fairly widely believed that the USA government favors US-
american companies. The EU might do this less, but would have a clear economic
interest in doing so, so I find this very plausible as well. I don't know how
many smaller personal data companies there are in the EU compared to the US,
but the major ones you hear about (Google, Facebook) are definitely in the
USA.

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jakeogh
The GDPR is an attack on memory. Article 13 is an attack on speech. It's
interesting to see the urgency of the push to implement them in the US; before
it's too obvious what they are really for.

