Information Technology and Innovation Foundation

I mean, you focus on policy issues related to IP standardization and innovation.

And you previously served as associate director for antitrust and innovation policy at the Information Technology and Innovation Foundation, as well as some time at the U.S. Federal Trade Commission.

Just speaking generally, what do you see as some of the biggest changes related to intellectual property and maybe even more specifically, the protection of intellectual property? I know that's a very broad question.

You know, if you just want to narrow it down to one or two things that you see are the biggest changes and or issues right now that we're facing.

On October 8th, Vice President Vance, J.D. Vance, the hillbilly elegy, announced that eight companies, including Microsoft and Adobe, are suspended from PERM, the labor department process employers use as the first step in sponsoring a foreign worker for a green card.

Daniel Castro of the Information Technology and Innovation Foundation, which is a tech policy think tank, said that the administration, quote, is handing that talent to countries such as Canada and the United Kingdom, along with the jobs, tax revenue and innovation those workers generate.

End quote.

Later that same day, Trump, the stable genius said, gave the National Medal of Technology and Innovation to Satya Nadella, the CEO of Microsoft, who was born in Hyderabad, India.

Well, it's interesting.

A few years ago, I and several other people won the Luddite of the Year Award from the Information Technology Innovation Foundation.

And they were really upset that we were pointing to potential risks from artificial intelligence.

It is sort of odd to be a Luddite when you've actually, I've been working on AI for 50 years.

So let's at least find out what's at the core of it all, what it is that we're talking about.

We're going to speak with Lawrence Zhang, who's head of policy for the Center for Canadian Innovation and Competitiveness at the Information Technology and Innovation Foundation.

Lawrence, thanks for joining us again.

Always appreciate your time.

But Lawrence, thanks for the chat so much.

I do appreciate it.

thank you very much um lauren jeng i think you know i learned a lot hope you did too but lawrence is the head of policy for the center for canadian innovation and competitiveness at the information technology and innovation foundation but you hear these stories and you start to think what's going on here literally what's happening you know when you hear stuff like ai can take over your smart oven So, but I got some, we were talking about that yesterday.

I was like, so who was, so what, who cares? But some people were, you know, taking me to task smartly, wisely saying, well, listen, What happens if it heats your crock pot up to the point where it explodes? Now, I don't know if that can even happen.

And make sure to check out the Great Capitalism newsletter on Substack, the place where our interview transcripts and other podcast-related essays get posted.

That's at greatcapitalism.substack.com. Now we're going to start by covering some recent headlines and events that you should know about, and then go on to my interview with Jack DeCastro, antitrust policy analyst at the Information Technology and Innovation Foundation.

We'll talk about antitrust law, the consumer welfare standard, how to be an entrepreneur, and the human value of economic growth.

It's a big week at the Supreme Court, mostly because of a case out of Colorado.

You can read that full statement, Modest job numbers signal slow economic growth, at cei.org. Those are the headlines for episode one hundred and ninety-five.

Now we'll move on to my interview with Jack Nicastro of ITIF.

[upbeat music] I would like to welcome to the show Jack Nicastro, antitrust policy analyst at the Information Technology and Innovation Foundation, where he is part of the Schumpeter Project on Competition Policy.

Welcome to Free the Economy, Jack.

So this is an interesting one.

Uh, ITIF's Steve Worona is challenging the use of research tax credits for Meta's AI data centre equipment.

Drawing on New York Times reporting, his critique asks whether the credit should support whatever equipment a tech company needs rather than genuinely additional research.

So it, obviously, it's a tax policy argument, but I mean, it's about the AI's economic promise needing to be weighed against the public revenue forgone, you know, and the services or opportunities that revenue could otherwise support.