Google Book Search, FCC Comments and the Minimum Wage
The Justice Department investigates Google’s legal settlement over its Book Search service.
Federal Communications Commission broadband coordinator Blair Levin accuses recent comments from the public of “sloppiness” and a “lack of seriousness.”
The federal minimum wage rises to $7.25 an hour.
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1. LEGAL
The Justice Department investigates Google’s legal settlement over its Book Search service.
CEI Expert Available to Comment: Policy Fellow Jonathan Hillel on the economics of the project:
“Digitizing orphan works will make them available, but there is no guarantee they would acquire market value or earn a profit. Google is paying a high upfront cost for this gambit in both infrastructure investment and settlement payments. Given all that investment, antitrust penalties on Google would allow its competitors to free-ride on its investment. Internet Archive President Peter Brantley has advocated requiring open access to the orphan works. In practice, that would mean that after Google pays to scan all orphan works, its competitors will be able to pick and choose which ones to offer.”
2. TECHNOLOGY
Federal Communications Commission broadband coordinator Blair Levin accuses recent comments from the public of “sloppiness” and a “lack of seriousness.”
CEI Expert Available to Comment: Vice President for Policy Wayne Crew summarizes our recent comment submission:
“Unfounded regulation and ‘national plans’ are damaging for the same reason all central economic planning is bad. It’s much deeper than a failure to know the price to set for any particular service, or where new communications services ought to be deployed across a vast nation. Tacit knowledge of individuals about proper prices to be set and appropriate service areas to energize are not accessible to external observers and regulators; they emerge from the competitive process itself. And knowledge of past prices and market conditions are not predictors of the future in any way.”
3. ECONOMY
The federal minimum wage rises to $7.25 an hour.
CEI Expert Available to Comment: Regulatory Studies Fellow Ryan Young on the impact of the increase:
“If there is one thing politicians are concerned about, it is creating jobs. They shouldn’t be setting minimum wages, then. Wage floors reduce the number of jobs. Young people with little or no work experience may not be able to offer $7.25 per hour worth of productivity; no wonder so many of them are having trouble finding summer jobs. They have to be paid more than they are worth.”
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