Members of Congress Push Back on SEC Climate Proposal
Skeptical members of Congress have begun weighing in on the Securities and Exchange Commission’s (SEC) recent climate disclosure proposal, and their objections are significant.
Why Does Goldman Sachs Fund An Economics Department?
Perpetually impoverished Peru has an annual government budget that’s a microscopic fraction of the U.S.’s. What’s spent annually by the South American country’s political class amounts to a tiny rounding error for Congress.
Woke Companies Beg Congress for Law and Order
Sean Pritchard, president of the San Jose Police Officers Association, mocked the companies for calling for tougher policies, telling Fox, “Many corporate leaders jumped on the woke bandwagon and wrote big checks to organizations that still continue to advocate to defund the police. They did not think of anything beyond not being labeled a racist.”
Amazon accidentally makes a case for its own regulation
Amazon is facing proposed regulation in Congress from an unusual bipartisan group concerned about its size and market power. In response, as David Dayen writes at The American Prospect, the company has deputized its entire population of third-party sellers as unpaid lobbyists, effectively threatening that if they don't convince Congress to stop the regulation, Amazon will shut down the third-party marketplace.
Amazon Warns Sellers: Marketplace Could Shut Down If Congress Tries to Regulate It
Amazon has warned hundreds of thousands of its third-party sellers through direct email communications that it may be forced to shut down its online marketplace if Congress passes bills regulating the conduct of digital platforms, according to a seller advocacy group.
Your New Woke 401(k)
While Democrats in Congress negotiate over trillions of dollars in new spending, the Biden Administration is quietly advancing its agenda through regulation. Witness a little-noticed proposed rule last week by the Labor Department that will add new political directives to your retirement savings.
Facebook is nearing a reputational point of no return
Disaster struck the world’s biggest social network on October 4th when Facebook and its sister apps were knocked offline for six hours. It was one of the less embarrassing moments of the company’s week. The next day a whistleblower, Frances Haugen, told Congress of all manner of wickedness at the firm, from promoting eating disorders to endangering democracy. Some wondered whether the world would be a better place if the outage were permanent.
Congress Must Pass A Federal Data Law
In the first six months of 2021, there were 1,767 data breaches reported across the globe, exposing over 18 billion records. To contextualize that number, more records were exposed in six months than people on earth. Data breaches not only compromise consumers’ and businesses’ financial situations, but they can also lead to unnecessary stress and anxiety.
Corporate America fights uphill battle against anti-China push
U.S. corporate giants are scrambling to beat back anti-China sentiment in Congress and the Biden administration, aiming to avert crackdowns that would hurt their ability to do business in the world’s second-largest economy.
ESG lobbying surges with Democratic control of Washington
More lobbyists reported raising environmental, social and governance issues with U.S. officials and lawmakers this year, with Democrats now controlling Washington, than ever before. “ESG” has been steadily appearing in more federal quarterly lobbying reports in recent years, according to a review of filings by CQ Roll Call. After the first mention of ESG came in mid-2018, references to the topic climbed during the final years of the Trump administration, which largely opposed the consideration of ESG and sustainability issues in regulation and legislation. Those issues are now at their highest point as regulators and members of Congress prepare policy on climate change.
SEC Unbound: Yet More Regulatory Creep
Federal agencies like the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) have long varied in their focus and priorities, depending on their current leadership and the ideological composition of their members. In the Biden era, however, we may be seeing the dawn of a new age in the federal regulatory apparatus: one in which regulatory agencies, originally created and given their responsibilities by Congress, will begin implementing policies that are directly opposed to their statutory missions.