In February, Elizabeth Warren, a presidential candidate for the 2020 election, made a public statement that she has a plan to break up some of the largest tech companies. Companies she mentioned were Amazon and Google, although she did not mention Apple, her campaign would still target the company. She states that these companies have too much power and influence over our economy, society, and democracy. She then goes on to mention how they have "used our private information for profit, and tilted the playing field against everyone else".
What are your thoughts? There's a price that consumers pay when they use free services like Facebook, and that's our data. There is a tradeoff for things that are free sometimes. In regards to her proposal on breaking up the tech companies, I believe that this is not necessary. It's one word. Competition. It's social Darwinism. Google was once a startup. Apple was once a startup. Amazon was once a startup. Every company has to start somewhere. We live in a society where consumers have the pleasure to chose what products and services they wish to use, and for a lot of people, they like Amazon and Google. Private companies are allowed to do what they would like, as long as it is within reason and under the law. For politicians to come in and disrupt the market is ignorant, in my opinion, and that is the inner capitalism in me speaking. I'm a big proponent for free markets and laissez-faire. However, what are your thoughts on her statements?
https://www.cnbc.com/2019/03/08/elizabeth-warren-pushes-to-break-up-companies-like-amazon-and-facebook.html
2 comments:
Connor, I was minutes from blogging about this but you beat me to it. I cannot wrap my head around this, as it takes back what the corporate American is all about. Now, there are a couple things I can understand.. First, I do agree that taking our data and using our information to steer our usage of the app can be a bit annoying and sometimes scary. Although, I agree with your point, these are free to use, and as we know, nothing is free so our data is what we sacrifice. Also, competition should in theory fix this issue, if a competitor to these come in and dont take our data (which they wouldnt because thats their $$) then maybe we can have new companies take over the space. The most interesting part, is that she targeted some of the biggest American companies before she runs for president, I have some suspicion that this wont turn out well for her.
I'm only too eager to echo the defense of market Capitalism that Connor and Antonio have already well articulated. To give Senator Warren some credit, although not much, some of the tech companies are now becoming conglomerates. Facebook now is not just Facebook but also Instagram and WhatsApp. Amazon is not just a retailer, it is also Amazon web services and Whole Foods. So I can see how a break up of these firms could be possible, while I personally think they would not be either probable or desirable.
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