On Friday, President Biden announced a comprehensive executive order that may amount to the single most consequential day of his young presidency. In one omnibus statement, Biden called on the Justice Department, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), the Federal Trade Commission (FTC), and other agencies to implement 72 specific provisions meant to encourage competition, raise wages, and weaken the force of monopolies in the American economy.
A number of those provisions mark substantial developments, and would be individually notable on their own. Biden’s recommendation on right to repair is a potential game changer for farmers, who are beholden to equipment manufacturers like John Deere and Caterpillar that functionally forbid them from repairing their own tractors, as well as for gamers seeking to modify their consumer electronics. The recommendation to drastically curtail the use of noncompete clauses, which were once used for corporate executives but now hamstring some 60 million American workers in low-wage sectors like janitorial services, represents a major transformation for the labor market as well. And the recommendation of reinstatement of the exceedingly popular net neutrality, vanquished by the Trump administration, is perhaps the biggest headline-grabber of them all. All of that, plus recommendations on patent law, surveillance, and occupational licensing are in Biden’s executive order, and more. And the overall thrust of the order, determined to protect workers, consumers, and entrepreneurs from the hazards of consolidated corporate interests, signals a dramatic change from the last 40 years of policy in Washington.
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