Legislation in Congress imperils America’s technological edge
ECONOMY
As New Hampshire’s working families struggle with record high inflation and gas prices, Congress is considering legislation that could further hike prices for consumers, sock it to small businesses and retirees, and threaten to hand over America’s technological edge to China.
What’s more, this rushed, election-year legislation could bring a bevy of unintended consequences that would only intensify our economic challenges.
The proposals in question are a set of misguided anti-innovation bills targeting the U.S. technology industry. Under the guise of “increasing competition,” these bills would actually increase prices and reduce selection for consumers by prohibiting large platform sellers from preferencing lower-cost brands they own. Nearly every retailer engages in this practice, which provides consumers with a wider selection at a better value. But with inflation at a 40-year high, some in Congress seem determined to close off this lower-price avenue for the most popular marketplaces, leaving consumers holding the (more expensive) bag.
The bills would also raise costs and cause operational challenges for many of New Hampshire’s 137,000 small businesses, which employ half of the state’s entire workforce. Nearly every one of these businesses rely on free or lowcost American technology products and services to grow their businesses and reach new customers — social media for awareness and advertising; search, mapping and email tools; product fulfillment services; as well as software, cloud storage and more. But by prohibiting selfpreferencing, Congress will directly boost a small business’s operational costs, leading to lower efficiencies, higher prices for consumers and reduced hiring.
Retirees — especially teachers, nurses, firefighters and police — also would be hurt by this anti-innovation legislation. A recent study found these bills could cost our economy $319 billion, leading to more than $250 million in retirement losses for public pension plan members in New Hampshire. Nearly 100,000 pensioners would be harmed, losing an estimated $2,715 in retirement benefits each.
Lastly, these bills threaten our national security. Despite cosmetic changes from the first draft, they still require U.S. companies to share sensitive data with foreign competitors and require tech platforms to justify security precautions. By weakening privacy and security controls for app stores, the bills would also allow bad actors to distribute malware and steal personal data more easily. Yet Congress so far has not held a single hearing — not one! — on the national security implications of these bills.
By not holding Chinese tech companies to the same stringent standards, the bills would essentially hand China an edge in the race for global tech leadership. But this wouldn’t be the first time Congress handed over an American strategic advantage to an adversary. In 2000, Congress passed misguided election-year legislation that ceded our manufactur ing edge to China. The result? According to Bureau of Economic Analysis data, America lost 5 million manufacturing jobs from 2000-20, with New Hampshire suffering a 32 percent decline — a loss of more than 34,000 manufacturing jobs. Technology has been a critical element in New Hampshire’s recovery from those job losses.
The bottom line: Technology isn’t just another sector of the economy; it’s the very backbone of our economic prosperity and our national security. Congress needs to take time to fully understand any negative unintended consequences. In fact, voters prefer that. More than eight in 10 Americans share these concerns about anti-tech bills and want Congress to address inflation and the rising cost of living, not enact anti-innovation legislation that compounds our economic challenges and hurts U.S. global competitiveness.
Doug Kelly is CEO of the American Edge Project, an organization founded and funded by Facebook.
