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Google, Facebook spend big on U.S. lobbying amid policy battles
- alkibiades 8y agoduh. you’d have to be incompetent not to with the way our political system works.
- acct1771 8y agoAnyone who doesn't loot defenseless stores is a fool!
- Nasrudith 8y agoThat has me thinking about extending the metaphor horrifically. Part of the answer for "why not?" has been "the owner has a gun". It obviously violence would be non-ideal on several levels but a really any sufficient counter force could work and probably would work better albeit with collective action problems. The reason "lobbying" works for cheap is because it helps get them elected. If it was as bad as having an extramarital affair or otherwise a kiss of death the "lobbying" would get more expensive. Similarly if lobbyists got boycotted to hell and back they would hesitate more.
- throwaway98121 8y agoWhich companies with a large footprint don’t spend big on lobbying efforts? I’m sorry but why is this news? Is it particularly nefarious or even noteworthy at all? No offense to op, but this is clickbait garbage.
- raxxorrax 8y agoIt is not clickbait. Even without further information about specific policies being pursued, the article has hard numbers about the amount spend for lobbying. I don't think that it is restricted to these quite low amounts, but the information is definitely interesting.
- Nasrudith 8y agoWell for years the tech industry was known for not lobbying but innovating. For a while the byphrase was "winners innovate, losers litigate". Given the decline combined with lobbying that is not a reassuring sign for the industry.
- Jerry2 8y agoLobbying is nothing more than legalized corruption. When companies lobby, they do so at the expense of the people and other, smaller, competitors who cannot afford to bribe politicians. Politicians should craft laws based on what's best for the country and not on what's best for the few corporations that manage to outbribe other companies. Also, remember when Google complained about lobbyists? Former Google CEO Erc Schmidt even admitted that most laws are written by lobbyists. >"The average American doesn't realize how much of the laws are written by lobbyists" to protect incumbent interests, Google CEO Eric Schmidt told Atlantic editor James Bennet at the Washington Ideas Forum. "It's shocking how the system actually works." https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2010/10/googles-ceo-the-laws-are-written-by-lobbyists/63908/ https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2010/10/googl...
- SamReidHughes 8y agoLet's say I'm a congressman and I meet with a lobbyist. How am I getting bribed?
- temp231239 8y agoPost retirement, same congressman get hired as an executive for the company or congressman starts an startup which is brought by the lobbyist company or ... There are far more complex ways for congressmen to receive benefits for accepting lobbyist agenda. Any action by congressman that doesn't make sense to common mass is result of lobbying. Every human being possesses basic intellect to konw what's good/or not for us and its the greed that persuade them to act differently.
- SamReidHughes 8y ago> Every human being possesses basic intellect to konw what's good/or not for us and its the greed that persuade them to act differently. This is obviously not true because then every voter would support the same policies. You can't even get everybody to agree on defunding public education!
- a_imho 8y agoNon native speaker here. What is the difference between government lobbying and corruption?
- SamReidHughes 8y agoLobbying is talking to congressmen, which isn't corrupt at all.
- a_imho 8y agoWhat is the $21.2 million figure for?
- mda 8y agoThat money is not given to the congresmen.
- reacweb 8y agoNot directly. It is given to all their friends. Their friends have helped them get elected and will again in future. Direct corruption is only used when you want to blackmail someone.
- SamReidHughes 8y agoPaying contractors to lobby for them.
- deleted 8y ago[deleted]
- jpkeisala 8y agoLobbying is organised persuasion of officials. Corruption is - at its simplest - paying officials. But organised persuasion can be expensive when you hire the best lobbyists (they are basically sales guys) and they will live in Trump Tower etc...
- ckastner 8y agoCan anyone explain how these numbers are calculated? Are these perhaps just expenses related to lobbying (eg: hiring an external agency, or expenses for a particular lobbying action)? Are salaries of internal staff included? $20m sounds ridiculously low. Giving the magnitude of these efforts, I'd expect the costs for the legal work alone to be far greater than that number.
- opportune 8y agoLobbying is actually shockingly cheap, that's why it's so effective for those willing to play the game. Look up the stakes (both sides) for net neutrality. Some people got bought for 4-figure sums
- ckastner 8y agoWell, not all of lobbying effort can be shockingly cheap. Referring to a quote attributed to Eric Schmidt from a sibling comment: > "The average American doesn't realize how much of the laws are written by lobbyists" You need lawyers for that, and that's certainly not going to be cheap. I don't think it's even remotely possible to do that with the $20m quoted in the article. If a company employs 3 lawyers full-time to work on some lobbying effort/issue XYZ, are their costs reflected in those $20m? What if they hire external lawyers? And that's just the legal side. I can think of all kinds of ancillary costs to lobbying, that it total wouldn't fit an annual budget of $20m. Not even close.
- pjc50 8y agohttps://www.opensecrets.org/lobby/clientsum.php?id=D000067823 https://www.opensecrets.org/lobby/clientsum.php?id=D00006782... : it seems to be by summing up costs to known lobbying agencies.
- ckastner 8y agoInteresting, so lobbying efforts from within the company appear to be unaccounted for. I'd also venture that ancillary costs (especially legal services) are unaccounted for. That really diminishes the meaning of the quoted $20m. For all we know, Google and Facebook could be spending ten times as much on staff lobbyists and lawyers.
- RcouF1uZ4gsC 8y agoThis increased lobbying by tech companies was the result of everyone taking the lesson of United States v Microsoft (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_v._Microsoft_Corp. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_v._Microsoft_Cor...) to heart and trying to make sure they did not end up in the government's crosshairs.
- olentzero 8y agoCan anyone explain how lobbying works in the U.S? Where does the money end up?
- temp231239 8y agoLobbying itself is not culprit as it has been present since the beginning of society. Only thing that make it heinous now is the change in mindset of people(more greedy). Its the responsibility of people to support virtuous corporations(choosing product they use) just like they vote their politicians to power.
- CoryG89 8y agoIf by lobbying you mean bribery, then yes, it has been around forever. I think the way it is done today, legitimized, in the open, and at scale, is a relatively recent phenomenon.
- deleted 8y ago[deleted]
- MichaelMoser123 8y agoNow facebook is working on election integrity. I love it how they are always able to find a cool name for everything.
- zimbatm 8y agoThe article does a poor job at putting the numbers in perspective. How much is it compared to other industries like Pharmaceutical or the aggro industry?
- ur-whale 8y agoIt's not exactly like they have much of a choice. Here's a piece on how Microsoft initially tried not to get sucked in the quagmire of DC lobbying: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QivPQdRc49s&t=155s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QivPQdRc49s&t=155s TL;DR: DC to MSFT : if you think we're going to let you do your thing without collecting a piece of the action, you're deluded.
- cemregr 8y agoAre we upset that big tech is lobbying, or are we upset about lobbying in general? I can’t think of any big US corporation that doesn’t spend money lobbying.