Big tech’s pro-climate rhetoric is not matched by policy action, report finds (opens in new tab)

Oil basically powers the modern world. Everything from food production through material manufacturing to basic transport collapses without oil.

Food abundance, even if it's can be barely called that like corn syrup, is the most basic soma. No politician would even think risking it.

Meanwhile you could swap out Facebook for any other social network with barely any noticeable change in the economy and world. People can scroll through Twitter or Netflix instead. Big tech has very little leverage because they rely on network effects and censorship while being otherwise imminently replaceable.

That they're run by nerds doesn't help either.

I have worked a lot with lobbyists and part of the reason is that the tech companies dont work together. When the banks or oil companies go to capital hill their lobbyists are generally in alignment. The sense iv gotten from folks I talk to is that is not the case with the tech companies and instead they have competing opinions on things.

Another place you can see this illustrated is when the CEOs of these companies testify in front of congress. The bank CEOs all stay more or less on the same message. Comparatively on the tech side there is a lot more variance in message. Some of this is changing, you can clearly tell Zuck is getting much more coaching and Sundar Pichai is well prepped. Then you have Dorsey who is always a complete wild card.

I see the opposite, big tech is massively benefiting from the lack of regulation of whatever kind so their interest is to lobby politicians to sit on their ass instead. I mean there is a huge assymetry between the regulation of the press and the non-regulation of the digital press which disguises itself as communication media, or the lack of any kind of gig work regulation. It's like the law is lagging 20 years behind , which is like eons in the digital age.

And if they cared about the housing situation they 'd have turned the workers to remote long before covid. In fact i d wager many of the tech millionaires benefit from the high prices of their own real estate investments. Plus the high prices ensure a continuous churn of eager immigrant workers, concentrated in a small area.

My guess: Big Oil, Big Pharma, Monsanto, etc, are old money. Big Tech is new money.

I'd wager that this one difference is the root of all the discrepancies you noticed.

This comes across as an odd position - you don’t think big tech has the ear of the president? Aren’t there pictures of Obama dining with Silicon Valley “elite”?

You mention building houses. The answer is of course big tech can get that done - it’s just not a priority regardless of what they say

Maybe because most tech companies (especially those in SF) provide little value for society? We need oil and food in order to survive. Do we need Facebook, Google, Netflix, etc to survive?

Has the tech industry been particularly pro-housing? It doesn’t seem to be where they’re focusing their lobbying efforts, despite some recent actions.

When you have legislators going to $35k/meal events while wearing ‘tax the rich’ clothing, you get the clear sense it’s all a nihilistic game.

> So it seems that Big Tech is actually taking concrete steps to become carbon zero, and even carbon negative. The article is complaining that they are not spending enough money lobbying for climate legislation.

Yes. It is good that they are cleaning up their own house, but to avoid the worst of the climate crisis we need all the leverage we can get.

We are out of time, we need to act now. In other words, big tech also needs to step up their lobbying, because federal legislation is the biggest lever we have.

Ironically, that was where they had the most impact (because they are mass media after all and their workplace cultures are very influential). But none of these issues affect their bottom line

Businesses are pro-abortions?

Maybe 25-50%, or so?

The $65M denominator on that percentage is also very low compared to typical industries, so the combination of low percentage and low denominator sticks out. Though I tend to credit tech for not lobbying a ton, unilateral disarmament is not always viewed positively.

Also, the only reason this editorial/article is being written at all is that tech is viewed as "friendly" and amenable to persuasion.

Though I do find it offensive that the tech companies are members of the Chamber of Commerce without refuting the Chamber's bad actions. That would be free! In fact, that's probably the biggest red flag for me in the article.

It is not anti-business to support climate action, quite the opposite. Yet somehow the Chamber pushes forward ridiculous and outdated politics that will harm most business in the end, while only benefitting fossil fuel companies and investors.

Tech really needs to stand up to bad organizations, or drop their membership. Their membership is a political action that is in direct contradiction to their stated goals.

What is "lobbying"? Lobbying is a process where subject-matter experts discuss policy with lawmakers. Lawmakers are not necessarily experts in 100% of topics, are they? So the industries have experts that lawmakers talk to. And of course, these industries make political contributions.

With no lobbyists, lawmakers are likely to be fairly clueless. With too much money and influence, lobbyists really call the shots, and Congress is basically subservient to them. There's a space in between where lawmakers are informed but don't owe lobbyists anything.

Lobbying isn't something that's not done I the EU or most european countries I'm aware of. Which countries are you referring to, which don't have lobbying?

Yes. It's allowed in Europe too.

Just like it is allowed (and officially sanctioned) in the EU

Lithium is not typically mined from rock today, though it may be in the future.

And "concerns" about that mining would carry far more weight if there was also concern about one or both of 1) extracting 1000s of tons of rock for steel and other parts of car manufacturing, or 2) extracting many multiples of that from the earth in the form of fossil fuels, which end up in the atmosphere and change the climate.

If a typical car travels for 200,000 miles, and gets 30mpg, then that car will consume 47,000 pounds of gasoline (requiring even more oil extraction), and emit 128,000 pounds of CO2 in its lifetime.

Though all of my personal political effort is directed at ways for people to live their lives with less car and still live their life as happy or happier, I find gripes about lithium extraction to be completely counterproductive to my goals. For all their faults, EVs' extraction of lithium is an order of magnitude better than the alternative and the status quo. And the people complaining about lithium are not proposing anything better, the are proposing sticking with fossil fuels.

Coal plants are closing down (and the planned ones are being canceled: https://twitter.com/DrSimEvans/status/1437704409048358919/ph...).

And any EV charged with non-coal electricity is far more climate friendly than ICE https://ec.europa.eu/jrc/en/jec/activities/wtw, and with improvements in battery production, EV design and more renewable energy on the grid everywhere, it just gets better year over year.

What's your point?

once it’s out out the ground it’s life cycle is nearly infinite(in our time frame reference) and isn’t single use. Battery’s have a very very long lifecycle befor turned back into new batteries. And it’s more efficient to burn fossil fuels in a power plant to power a ev than it is to burn them directly in a vehicle.

but yes self driving space is scam