Tag:Journal of Regulatory Compliance
A Case for Regulating Facebook
Recently, whistleblower Frances Haugen testified before a Senate subcommittee that Facebook has been deliberately putting its own profits before users’ safety. As Facebook’s former product manager for civic misinformation, Haugen calls for federal regulation of social media platforms and asserts that Facebook will not solve what she calls a “crisis” of deliberately ignoring users’ wellbeing for the sake of its own profits without Congress’s help. She points to tobacco, automobiles, and opioids, stating that when it became clear that those products were harming people, the government took action.
Regulating Government Agencies & Contractors: Banning the Use of ‘Hostile Architecture’ Through A City-Wide Ordinance
The way we construct our buildings, parks, and communities are reflective of our collective interests and values. Often when constructing public spaces, contractors and city officials employ deliberate methods of design that discourage their use by homeless people, this is known as hostile architecture. From bifurcated city benches to boulders being placed under city overpasses, hostile architecture is an affirmative policy action that is used by cities to discourage and eliminate use of public spaces by those who are unhoused. Collectively, these actions amount to another weapon in the arsenal of government actors in their war against homeless people, instead of homelessness. In order to stop these harmful building and design policies, cities around the United States, including Chicago, should implement regulatory policies banning their use with public funds or through governmental contractors.
Demonetize the Children
The Fair Labor Standards Act (“the Act”), enacted in 1938, protects public and private employees with a federal minimum wage, requirements for overtime pay, and youth employment standards. Despite protections established for children under the Act, children in the entertainment industry are expressly excluded from its protections. Instead, minors in the entertainment industry must rely on state regulation of their employment, which is often stricter and more protective than the Act. However, there is a massive loophole in that the entertainment industry in most states does not include child influencers and social media stars. With the increase in social media in the last decade, children in the social media sector are left in limbo about their rights and employment protections. State entertainment laws for minors must be extended to include the fast-growing number of children growing up in social media fame.
The Ableist and Racist Public Charge Rule
The Public Charge Rule perpetuates anti-immigrant sentiment and keeps poor, disabled migrants who were often Black, Brown, and ethnically oppressed out of the United States. It makes pathways to citizenship contingent upon wealth and the absence of disability. As the Autistic Self Advocacy Network puts it, the Public Charge Rule is a “clear echo of the racist and ableist policies of the eugenics era.”
FDA-USPTO Collaboration and Bipartisan Efforts to Lower Drug Prices
The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has partnered with the Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) to address the high cost of prescription drugs. While the FDA possesses the authority to approve generic, lower cost drugs, the USPTO has an important and symbiotic role in bringing affordable drugs to market by blocking anti-competitive patent extensions. FDA-USPTO collaboration has gained congressional support and is the subject of key pieces of new legislation.
Concert Venues Crowd Control Regulations
On November 5, 2021, Travis Scott performed a concert at the Astroworld Festival in Austin to a crowd of fifty thousand people. In the hour that he performed, eight people were killed in a deadly crowd crush (another concert goer losing their life days after), and hundreds were injured. Multiple lawsuits have been filed against Travis Scott himself, as well as the production companies that organized the show in response to the tragedy. In the wake of the devastating event, regulations concerning crowd control and management must also be considered, as well as whether these regulations were complied with by the organizers of Astroworld.
The Discriminatory Policies against Gay and Bisexual Men that are Fueling the National Blood Crisis
This past January, the American Red Cross announced that the United States was facing its worst blood shortage in over a decade, posing a significant risk to patient care and causing doctors to make difficult decisions in determining which patients should be prioritized for blood transfusions given the dwindling supply. The staggering decrease in blood and platelet donations can be attributed to the global COVID-19 pandemic driving up the need for donations and the hesitancy people have had to leave their homes over the past two years. Even in this desperate time of need for blood, gay and bisexual men in America are still prevented from donating because of discrimination.
Critical Infrastructure and Cybersecurity Legislation: America’s Cybersecurity Problem
Long gone are the days when cybersecurity concerns existed solely in the domain of technology teams. Various organizations, from schools to government entities (at every level), to private companies alike have fallen prey to cyberattacks. May 2021’s Colonial Pipeline attack caused chaos and a temporary gas frenzy that brought awareness of the vulnerabilities of the technology we rely on to even the least technically minded American. Cybersecurity, and more specifically, the security of critical infrastructure immediately became an issue that the U.S. Government is taking very seriously.
Stablecoins II: The Stablecoin Innovation and Protection Act of 2022
On Tuesday, February 15, 2022, Congressman Josh Gottheimer released a draft of the Stablecoin Innovation and Protection Act of 2022 (“the bill”). This legislation attempts to both define stablecoins as well as provide a legal framework in which the issuers and users of stablecoins can safely and legally operate. The bill is surprisingly brief, only nine pages long, but Gottheimer claims that it will provide greater direction and certainty to the marketplace in order to boost innovation while also protecting consumers.
First Amendment Rights and Florida’s “Don’t Say Gay” Bill
Florida’s “Don’t Say Gay” bill, which would bar Florida educators from speaking to students about LBGTQ+ topics that are not considered “age-appropriate or developmentally appropriate for students” has passed in Florida’s House and is likely to pass in the Senate as it now moves to the Republican-controlled Senate floor for a vote. The horrific piece of legislation, formally known as HB 1557, has raised questions as to whether the bill, if passed, would violate the First Amendment rights of teachers or students in public primary schools across the sunshine state.