Government

The news: The House Judiciary Committee took up legislation Wednesday targeting the monopolistic and anticompetitive practices of US tech giants, per Bloomberg. This first notable bipartisan push is aimed at reigning in Amazon, Apple, Facebook, and Google’s market dominance. Big Tech lobbyists argue that, if passed into law, the bills would curtail innovation and could upend user privacy, as well as hurt small businesses relying on their services

Tech giants are facing increasingly hostile foreign governments that are taxing their profits, attempting to halt their acquisitions, labeling them as monopolies and passing laws to limit their powers.  Why it matters: Big Tech’s international policy challenges mean companies are positioning themselves for regulatory fights overseas while the U.S. is still struggling to figure out what it wants to do.

The Federal Trade Commission sued Facebook, alleging that the company is illegally maintaining its personal social networking monopoly through a years-long course of anticompetitive conduct. Following a lengthy investigation in cooperation with a coalition of attorneys general of 46 states, the District of Columbia, and Guam, the complaint alleges that Facebook has engaged in a systematic strategy—including its 2012 acquisition of up-and-coming rival Instagram, its 2014 acquisition of the mobile messaging app WhatsApp, and the imposition of anticompetitive conditions on software developers—to eliminate threats to its monopoly. This course of conduct harms competition, leaves consumers with few choices for personal social networking, and deprives advertisers of the benefits of competition.

The Federal Trade Commission has released a new publication for online influencers that lays out the agency’s rules of the road for when and how influencers must disclose sponsorships to their followers.

American families and small businesses are rightfully skeptical of traditional advertising, which is clearly designed to persuade or manipulate us. In an effort to make advertising appear more authentic, companies are increasingly pouring marketing dollars into social media influencers: the individuals who promote products, services, and brands to those who follow them online.

Only a small percentage of older Americans, seven percent, receive income from Social Security, a defined benefit pension, and a defined contribution account. Retirement income from these three sources is widely considered to be the ideal situation to ensure retirement security, particularly for the middle class. Retirees with these three sources of income are far less likely to face poverty and economic hardship.

The U.S. Census Bureau launched its first set of advertisements for the 2020 Census in Alaska this week, about one month ahead of the kick off to the 2020 Census in remote Alaska in January 2020. The advertisements will inform those living in approximately 220 Alaska Native villages that a census taker will soon visit their home to count them in the 2020 Census. For the rest of Alaska, and the rest of the country, the 2020 Census begins in mid-March.

Knowing that the census guides how much money a community gets from the government is the most important reason for people to respond to the census, according to results from a 2018 Census Bureau survey.

Top policy experts and trade organizations today launched the new “Privacy for America” coalition, which will work with Congress to support enactment of groundbreaking comprehensive federal consumer data privacy and security legislation.

As promotional and outreach activities are ramping up across the nation ahead of the 2020 Census — from establishing local and state complete count committees, to diverse partners coming together to reduce the undercount of children and other hard to count populations — tthe U.S. Census Bureau announced its long-planned communications campaign platform: “Shape your future. START HERE.”

VMLY&R announced the 2020 Census Media Vendor Day for the 2020 U.S. Census Paid Media Campaign. The event is designed to be accessible for media outlets that cover a wide range of audiences, demographics, and channels, as well media outlets that are small businesses, and women- or minority-owned.

The U.S. Census Bureau released results from the 2020 Census Barriers, Attitudes and Motivators Study (CBAMS). The national survey and series of focus groups were designed to better understand the nation’s attitudes toward the 2020 Census, potential barriers that may inhibit participation, and possible motivators of responding.

The Federal Bureau of Investigations has contacted the Association of National Advertisers (ANA) legal counsel regarding an investigation into the media buying practices in our Industry.  The ANA has sent the following letter to its members.

Once every 10 years, the U.S. Census Bureau undertakes a gargantuan task, one that the founding fathers of the United States considered so important they mandated it as part of the Constitution. The decennial census exists to compile an accurate count of every person living in the U.S. and to record basic demographic data such as age, sex, and race. Its primary purpose is to serve as an underpinning for the country’s representative democracy, making sure each community gets the right number of representatives in Congress and that public funds are equitably distributed.  By Michael J. McDermott

Lately, US lawmakers have been a little obsessed with big tech firms.

Recruiting enough workers to fill the hundreds of thousands of temporary positions needed to take the 2020 Census won’t be easy, given the current economic climate, but the Census Bureau is more than up to the challenge.

U.S. Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos announced the Federal Commission on School Safety (FCSS) will meet this week to gain more insight into how entertainment, media, cyberbullying and social media may affect violence and student safety.

The 2018 Edelman Trust Barometer reveals that trust in the U.S. has suffered the largest-ever-recorded drop in the survey’s history among the general population. Trust among the general population fell nine points to 43, placing it in the lower quarter of the 28-market Trust Index. Trust among the informed public in the U.S. imploded, plunging 23 points to 45, making it now the lowest of the 28 markets surveyed, below Russia and South Africa.

The Culture Marketing Council (CMC) believes that the addition of the citizenship question will decrease census participation, causing the census to yield inaccurate results.

A new study conducted by Radius Global Market Research and MorphoTrust USA, part of OT-Morpho, shows the majority of the U.S. public is ready for the traditional plastic driver’s license to go mobile.