Our Blog

Clear All Filters

July 21, 2023 | The Sling

Dylan Gyauch-Lewis

Op-Ed Economic PolicyMedia Accountability

The Inane Indignation Around Sellers’ Inflation

Conventional economists have been bristling about sellers’ inflation being presented as an alternative to the more staid explanation of a wage-price spiral (we’ll come back to that), but in recent months there have been extremely aggressive (and often condescending, self-important, and factually incorrect) attacks on the idea and its proponents. Despite this, sellers’ inflation really is not that far from a lot of long standing economic theory, and the idea is grounded in key assumptions about firm behavior that are deeply held across most economic models.

July 17, 2023

KJ Boyle

Blog Post Anti-MonopolyCongressional OversightEthics in GovernmentFTCTech

Lina Khan Unscathed By Conflicted Ethics Officer and Pro-Monopoly Republicans

Rep Jim Jordan and company had already been eyeing Khan for an investigation because she had the audacity to enforce a consent decree that Twitter violated under Elon Musk’s leadership. Then, they eagerly seized on last month’s (conveniently timed) reporting from Bloomberg which published a previously unseen memo from an FTC ethics official and accused Chair Khan of ignoring the official’s recommendation. With that backdrop, the Republicans seemed poised to strike while the iron was hot, a culmination of their years-long project to undermine Khan’s leadership and reputation. The result was … much different. Thanks to some sleuthing on our part and the bipartisan support for taking on tech monopolies, yesterday’s hearing was less a damning inquisition and more a victory lap for Khan’s rejuvenation of the FTC.

July 14, 2023

Timi Iwayemi

Hack WatchNewsletter CryptocurrencyEthics in GovernmentFinancial Regulation

The Crypto Industry Thinks Gary Gensler Should Recuse Himself From Enforcement Actions.

If we were to agree to the industry’s demand that policy experts should be precluded from regulating issues they have spent significant amounts of time developing expertise in, we would be setting a precedent that severely undermines any kind of public-minded enforcement. In fact, banning experts such as Gensler would leave the public with a pool of potential regulators who are either already corporate-aligned or unqualified to adequately opine on pressing issues.

July 13, 2023

Andrea Beaty

Press Release

Anti-MonopolyCongressional OversightFTC

RELEASE: Via Baseless Attacks On Khan, House Republicans Continue to Serve their Monopolist Funders

“Today’s hearing further proved that Republican’s attacks on Lina Khan and her leadership are blatant attempts to weaken antitrust enforcement to the benefit of the corporations that fund the Republican Party. Members, including Jim Jordan, focused on baseless allegations in an attempt to delegitimize the work the FTC is doing to crack down on anti-competitive and harmful practices that monopolistic companies use to amass economic power and squeeze profits out of consumers and workers.” 

July 11, 2023

Timi Iwayemi

Blog Post Revolving DoorTechTrade Policy

A Corporate-Led Trade Agenda Is the Wrong Path Forward

Yet despite these promises, email correspondence obtained through FOIA requests by Demand Progress show that senior officials across USTR, including Deputy U.S. Trade Representative Sarah Bianchi, actively seek input from executives at Big Tech firms such as Amazon and Google. Giving Big Tech a privileged ability to mold American trade policy undermines Biden’s commitment to a new era of trade deals.