Tech Briefing 2001

Tech Briefing 2001

A Free-Market Guide to Navigating Tech Issues in the 107th Congress

High tech issues are at center stage in the 107th Congress. Broadband deployment, intellectual property, internet regulation and taxation, the “digital divide,” long distance telephony–all present problems that are politically contentious as well as technically and economically complex.

The Competitive Enterprise Institute is a non-profit public policy organization dedicated to principles of free enterprise and limited government. It holds that free people and free markets can accomplish prodigies, and that government interventions must be both limited and carefully crafted. Government can indeed provide grease to lubricate the joints of the economy, but too much existing and proposed regulation is produced by special interests, conceived in ignorance, or both. These regulations become not grease but superglue that cements the status quo, deters investment, and prevents innovation.

In Tech Briefing 2001: A Free Market Guide to Navigating Tech Issues in the 107th Congress, CEI’s experts apply this perspective to 20 topics that are high on the current national agenda. Each chapter briefly describes the technology behind the issue, outlines the policy debate, and offers CEI’s view of the policy. Endnotes provide sources for factual statements and guideposts for further research.

Table of Contents

Introduction

by Fred L. Smith, Jr.

Reform of the Federal Communications Commission

by Solveig Singleton

Direct Research and Development Grants

by Solveig Singleton

Market-Driven Spectrum Reform

by Solveig Singleton

Universal Service for Telecommunications

by Solveig Singleton

Bell Entry into Long-Distance Service