>The complete failure of IT privacy in the US proves that voting with your dollar and voice doesn't work. The very existance of companies like Google, Facebook

>The complete failure of IT privacy in the US proves that voting with your dollar and voice doesn't work. The very existance of companies like Google, Facebook and thousands of others whose main purpose if data analytics proves that. I don't think voting with your dollar is a failure, I just think it's currently too niche a hobby to move mountains. From my completely unscientific empiricism, it seems only super hot button issues, regarding religion for example, cause enough Americans to weigh a company's economic policies vs their ideological ones in large enough numbers while also making enough noise about it. Many consumers seem to make one dimensional decisions when choosing a product or service: How much does it cost? This is exacerbated by the amount the public sphere is taking over private decision making, not ameliorated. For example, citizens concerned with wage disparity aren't buying goods whose executives pay their workers fairly; they're shopping at Walmart. For some reason, economic or ideological issues that stem from the market aren't the market's problem, but become a problem for Washington. Do I think putting the mean and median wage of non-executive employees on the package would help here? Not until we decide these are problems of the market, but honest information disclosure will be important then. On top of that, a great many consumers are happy with the status quo. "Personal information" is some nebulous magical currency that they can get free stuff for. Just because you or I value this doesn't mean most people do. I've talked with a great many, otherwise intelligent, people that would have it no other way. They can use Facebook for free and to them the value gained far and wide exceeds the costs. You and I personally think this calculation is short sighted and incorrect, but if you assume the consumer is too stupid to make decisions for themselves regarding their own information then where does that lead us as a society? (not to mention the regulatory overhead)