The Biden Administration & Advertising: Predictable Change for the United States

Policymaking predictability The single most important issue for the industry is of course the high likelihood that policymaking will feature more rigor and formal process rather than something that is personalitydriven and ad hocEven in areas where this involves more regulation such as automotive fuel standards predictability of policy making is ultimately more favorable for the economy as it allows companies to better plan for the future and invest with higher degrees of certaintySimilarly we would expect a higher likelihood that actions initiated by the Department of Justice will be driven independently of the White House which in practical terms means that individuals knowing the preferences of the President will not be specifically assigned to roles where they are responsible for deciding when cases of particular interest to the President will be pursued or ignored This would provide more predictability for companies pursuing mergers and acquisitions for exampleConsequently when actions are taken that may have some merit behind them we would expect formalized processes leading to cases that have a higher likelihood of withstanding judicial scrutiny and ultimately succeedingOutcome of the Senate races will impact whether or not new laws will be passed At a more tactical level the degree to which the administration will be able to establish new policies will depend heavily on the outcome of the runoff elections in Georgia which will in turn determine whether or not the Senate is controlled by the Democrats or RepublicansIf Republicans hold on to at least one seat less legislation will be likely to pass both houses of Congress This means a status quo will hold with respect to adding or eliminating laws although there will still be significant latitude for the administration to use executive actions now demonstrated as a legally if not politically acceptable approach in many instances to accomplish new policy objectives or existing laws to accomplish policy goalsIf the Democrats can win both seats it does not mean that there will necessarily be meaningful changes any one Democratic senator would suddenly have an effective veto power over legislation which in practical terms likely means that the moderates especially those facing election in 2022 will have particular importanceFederal privacy law seems unlikely at this time Either way there is no particular momentum behind a national privacy law akin to GDPR in Europe although circumstances could certainly evolve to lead to oneStates seem more likely to establish laws of their own which could have the effect of leading to a similar approach to data privacy in both territoriesWe note that the newly updated California data privacy law does not yet require those who secure data to persuade consumers to quotoptinquot to sharing data and instead is focused on an quotoptoutquot approachBy contrast GDPR is intended to require an quotoptinquot approach even if that notion is not uniformly applied at presentSection 230 of the Communications Decency Act seems likely to be changed or revoked There is on the other hand serious momentum and bipartisan support behind finding ways to regulate quotbig techquot that can take several formsFor example this could include revoking or otherwise modifying Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act which generally provides platforms including Google and Facebook with immunity from liability for harm that occurs to users because of actions those platforms take or fail to preventIt seems somewhat inevitable that platforms will begin to take greater responsibility one way or another which should ultimately lead to more brandsafe environments even if doing so leads to some reduction in usage by a small share of platform usersThe rise of new platforms that do not restrict users39 comments may occur but they too could ultimately bear responsibility for consequences that follow from use of their platformsBig tech probably will be broken up or choose to break itself up Antitrust actions will still occur whether initiated by the DOJ or FTC although as indicated above we would expect more rigor to go into the actions that the government takesThere is a consensus albeit one formed for different reasons by different parties that the largest companies in the United States are too big The specific way breakups occur is difficult to anticipate but seems inevitable nonethelessIn some instances breakups will occur voluntarily while in others they will occur because a court mandates it after many years of litigationTo the extent that today39s digital media giants find their businesses separated we would find ourselves with a media world slightly fragmented into a slightly bigger number of massive globally oriented digital media companies Each of them would likely have their own quotwalled gardensquot and each would be better positioned than now to acquire other companies or otherwise allocate resources more efficiently to drive faster growth than occurs presentlyThis could mean that they would collectively take a greater share of spending than they do as fewer larger companies todayNational security will still overlap with media industry issues when foreign companies are involved National security will also be another area that will see some similarities between the new administration and the prior oneThe situation with TikTok while approached hamhandedly over the summer of 2020 was not without its merits either There are from an American perspective legitimate longterm concerns about whether or not personal data of American citizens might wind up in the hands of a foreign government let alone one that is likely to be continually viewed as a strategic competitor at best and an adversary at worstWhile it39s certainly possible that Bytedance or other Chinese companies will be able to invest and operate in the United States and with its closest global allies the thrust of geopolitics suggests that a Biden Administration will not necessarily favor radically different policies than what we saw under Trump eitherGlobal trade will impact what brands are in the US Global trade is one other area impacting the advertising industry where we expect to see only modest changeUnder Trump we saw policies that favored restrictions on imports in order to encourage more manufacturing domestically This was generally contrary to the bipartisan approach of prior decades which generally favored reducing tariffs that had the effect of increasing the economy39s reliance on services while reducing domestic manufacturing activityOf course one of the great mistakes of that era was a general failure to provide sufficient support for individuals negatively impacted by this transition and we could argue that one consequence is less support for global trade among supporters of both political partiesTo the degree that there are looser trade policies under the new administration this would contribute to more economic growth and the presence of more brands within the economy while the opposite would be true if a status quo direction is maintainedCopyright and Republished with permissionamp160Click the social buttons to share this story with colleagues and friendsThe opinions expressed here are the author39s views and do not necessarily represent the views of MediaVillagecomMyersBizNetamp160

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The Biden Administration & Advertising: Predictable Change for the United States

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Brian Wieser

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