Capitalism and Control: An Examination of Capitalist Trends against Consumers

Authors

Sravan Ramaswamy, Santa Clara University

Document Type

Article

Publication Date

8-31-2016

Abstract

This article will be covering a number of debates over years. A number of studies have been done on the nature of privacy and its place in the modern world as we move forward in the digital age. One study called "The Privacy-Innovation Conundrum" by Ted Zarsky argues for the existence of a tradeoff that policy makers have to make between favoring innovation and hurting privacy or favoring privacy, but reducing the incentive to create new ideas[1]. This argument makes a great deal of sense if we view information as not dissimilar to money. However, it leaves open interpretation for how policy makers are to proceed. There is also the discussion of how Net Neutrality should be approached from an economics perspective. On one side of the debate, researchers argue that the market for broadband internet is in fact a two-sided market, and thus regulating the market would be inefficient to the goal of society. The other side argues that the internet bears resemblance to the electric grid as a utility application, thus not regulating broadband internet would cause inefficiencies in the innovation space of the internet. Another debate that this article will cover is the nature of exploitation that companies like Facebook and Google engage. One side of the debate argues that Facebook is company that explicitly exploits all the information that is provided to the consumers without appropriate compensation while the other argues that the service of Facebook and Google as information aggregates serve as good compensation.

Recommended Citation

Ramaswamy, Sravan, "Capitalism and Control: An Examination of Capitalist Trends against Consumers" (2016). Pop Culture Intersections. 8.
https://scholarcommons.scu.edu/engl_176/8