Policy-ish Talk

🎙️ Exploring tax changes on Policy-ish podcast! Host Isaac Schick and guest Pete Sepp discuss the R&D tax credit's vital role in fostering innovation and economic growth. As negotiations unfold in Congress, the urgency to strike a deal for sustained economic growth becomes clear. 🌐🔍 #PolicyPodcast #TaxChanges #EconomicGrowth 📈✨

The U.S. currently enjoys the largest and most productive freight rail network in the world. Yet, there seem to be growing efforts pushing to roll back this success and re-institute some of the same regulations that brought the railroad industry to the brink of collapse forty years ago. Joining me in this episode to discuss the consequences of reregulation and what it means for consumers is Marc Scribner, senior transportation policy analyst at Reason Foundation.

The COVID-19 pandemic really prompted a revolution for telehealth services. At the beginning of 2020, only 0.1% of all medical visits in the US each week were conducted via telemedicine. Fast forward to February this year, the overall telehealth use for office visits and outpatient care was 38 times higher than in 2020. Since the expansion of telehealth is largely dependent on access to high-speed internet service, in this episode FCC's Commissioner Brendan Carr sits down with Kris Pusok to discuss the current challenges in the telehealth landscape and the FCC’s efforts in expanding this type of healthcare.

Proposed labor reforms like the PRO Act seek to radically transform parts of the economy and reshape the American workplace. But they do so by boosting unions’ power at the expense of workers and job creators. In this episode, Patrice Onwuka, the director of the Center for Economic Opportunity at the Independent Women’s Forum, and I take a deep dive into what this legislation entails and how it affects independent workers, women, and small businesses.

The Senate recently passed the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, a bipartisan $1 trillion investment in the country’s physical infrastructure, which allocates $65 billion in broadband spending and is awaiting action by the House. 

In this episode, Kris Pusok sits down with former chairman of the Federal Communications Commission, Ajit Pai, to discuss what this infrastructure deal means for rural communities and what else policymakers and the industry should be doing to make internet more accessible to unconnected communities. The episode dives into the technology aspect, the public versus private broadband provision, and speed requirements to achieve progress in closing the digital divide. 

Many lawmakers seem eager to rein in the power of big tech and there seems to be a wide-spread agreement across the political aisle that something needs to be done. Among the proposed remedies is to restrict mergers and acquisitions. 

In this episode, Jeff Farrah,  General Counsel at the National Venture Capital Association, is sharing his perspective on the intricacies of what antitrust means in the context of the innovation and the startup ecosystem. 

The modern workforce is changing. Technology is making it easier for people of all education, skills, and income levels to be part of the sharing economy as independent contractors. Yet, several regulatory and legislative initiatives expose the long-term viability of this working arrangement and the benefits it provides. In this episode, John Chisholm, entrepreneur, CEO, and investor, shares his perspectives on how essential independent contractors are for startups and innovation and how the current legislative and regulatory actions affect the innovation climate.

The U.S. currently has no comprehensive national law governing data collection and privacy, and while experts in Washington have been calling for federal data privacy legislation for a while now, we’ve seen very little movement on this issue in Congress. In the absence of federal regulation, more states are advancing their own data privacy bills. 

In this episode, Cameron Kerry, Ann R. and Andrew H. Tisch Distinguished Visiting Fellow at Brooking's Center for Technology Innovation, discusses the need and importance of a federal data privacy and security legislation, and what lessons Congress can learn from states and countries that have already passed legislations. 

While Congress banned the sale of tobacco products to anyone under 21, several states across the U.S. have implemented and considered various bans on flavored vaping products and e-cigarettes. What is the impact of these regulatory and legislative actions on the overall public health? 

In this episode, R Street Institute's research fellow, Chelsea Boyd, shares her perspective on the current state of tobacco harm reduction policy and e-cigarette regulation.

India, South Africa, and other developing countries are leading the push for a waiver of the Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS Agreement) under the rationale that it’s the only way to ensure equitable and affordable access to COVID vaccines.

In this episode, Andrei Iancu, former undersecretary of commerce for intellectual property (IP) and director of the USPTO, discusses the Biden Administration’s decision to support the proposed waiver and why waiving certain IP protections for COVID-19 related drugs and products will not deliver the needed equitable and affordable access to COVID vaccines that other countries are hoping for.