Chalk
Being an education entrepreneur is hard work.
Navigating Regulatory Change in Higher Education
Federal money is the instrument with which universities are bonded to government control by regulation.
‘There are many more regulations than even 10 years ago. Congress and federal agencies are focused on a variety of issues, such as sexual harassment, antisemitism, Islamophobia, ethical research, foreign influence in research, disinformation or censorship, and endowment spending. The hook for all of these inquiries, investigations, and hearings is that universities are federal contractors that receive hundreds of millions of dollars, even billions, in federal financial aid, research contracts and grants.’
How Regulations Constrain Education Entrepreneurship and Innovation
Regulation is an unusually daunting obstacle for entrepreneurs tackling problems in education.
‘“The issue was that the zoning officer informed me back in January that if we meet the state’s description of a childcare center, we would be permitted to operate at our location, but during the process of obtaining our childcare center license, the zoning supervisor shut us down, admitting that she is not familiar with microschools,” said Lucas, who has spent the last several weeks pushing back against these local regulators. During one recent meeting with town officials, she convinced them that she meets all state requirements for a licensed childcare center and that her building is zoned properly for this use. They agreed with her, but said that building codes have changed and Lucas now needs to comply with new rules, such as making sure the school’s parking lot is 35 feet away from the neighboring building. Lucas’s building is 32 feet away, so now she needs to appear in front of the planning board for variance approval.’
The Harris Broadband Rollout Has Been a Fiasco
There is one policy and one thousand policy objectives. What could go wrong?
The nameplate objective here is to provide broadband access to those who don’t have it.
Once this was in place, the governing authority for the federal government’s cash disbursements started piling on other requirements, including regulating the rates providers could charge and dictating the kinds of people they could hire to do the work. They also essentially banned satellite services such as Starlink (that could be activated quickly and inexpensively) in favor of a preference for fiber-optic cable.
This led to two predictable consequences. Only the big providers are bidding; small vendors can’t manage the red tape. And nothing has been built yet.
‘The 2021 infrastructure law included $42.5 billion for states to expand broadband to “unserved,” mostly rural, communities. Three years later, ground hasn’t been broken on a single project. The Administration recently said construction won’t start until next year at the earliest, meaning many projects won’t be up and running until the end of the decade.
‘Blame the Administration’s political regulations. States must submit plans to the Commerce Department about how they’ll use the funds and their bidding process for providers. Commerce has piled on mandates that are nowhere in the law and has rejected state plans that don’t advance progressive goals.
‘Take how the Administration is forcing providers to subsidize service for low-income customers. Commerce required that Virginia revise its plan so bidders had to offer a specified “affordable” price. This is rate regulation.’
The Dish on Spectrum and Politics
Things move fast. Antitrust authorities blocked a Dish-DirecTV merger in 2002 because of concerns it would reduce competition in the market for TV delivered via satellite. Today, TV delivered by anything is in decline and Charlie Ergen needs some cash to fund his wireless spectrum ambitions. I use the word ambitions because it has only been a dream to date, years after he acquired the resource and promised to use it.
Just as the agencies did not foresee any changes to the competitive landscape in 2002, there are those who would oppose the rerun here. Presumably, they do so in a kneejerk fashion. If a billionaire genius like Ergen wants it, then it can’t be good, right?
These were the same people who presumably opposed Sprint/T-Mobile. A stronger third player spurred competition in a way that a weak third and a weaker fourth competitor never could. Dynamics are hard.
Never mind that Ergen needed (and received) an extension on his requirement to build out the spectrum he acquired. It’s nice to have friends. Nobody has more friends than a wealthy dude.
‘Flash back to 2018 when T-Mobile sought to acquire a struggling Sprint. They owned complementary spectrum bands, but neither operated a nationwide network that could rival the big two. Progressives nonetheless opposed the merger because they said it would reduce telecom competition and increase prices.
‘Wrong. The merger spurred more competition by prompting Verizon and AT&T to increase broadband investment and reduce prices. Even as inflation has surged, wireless prices have remained flat since 2018. However, as a condition for green-lighting the merger, Trump antitrust cops required the companies to sell their prepaid phone business and some spectrum to Dish.’
How Florida Keeps Electricity Plentiful and Rates Low
Bureaucracy is meant to be a tool to direct outcomes. It distorts decisions by changing incentives, instead.
The best answer is not to play. Even when it means rejecting what appears to be free money.
Theres is no such thing as free money.
‘One persistent problem is suffocating red tape. To placate environmentalists, the Biden-Harris administration rolled back Trump-era reforms to the federal permitting process, even those that benefited renewable energy. Now Inflation Reduction Act subsidies are flooding the market with solar energy, so nuclear, coal and gas plants needed for base-load generation can’t fully recoup costs.
‘These subsidies have proved particularly toxic in states governed by regional transmission organizations, or RTOs, where utilities can’t easily pass capital and operating costs on to consumers. This has led to soaring future capacity prices in RTO areas such as Pennsylvania, Ohio and Virginia, where capacity prices soared 900% in the recent auction for 2024-25. Meanwhile, virtually all large new nuclear and gas capacity being proposed is in non-RTO areas that still have vertically integrated utilities, chiefly Florida.
‘One persistent problem is suffocating red tape. To placate environmentalists, the Biden-Harris administration rolled back Trump-era reforms to the federal permitting process, even those that benefited renewable energy. Now Inflation Reduction Act subsidies are flooding the market with solar energy, so nuclear, coal and gas plants needed for base-load generation can’t fully recoup costs.
‘These subsidies have proved particularly toxic in states governed by regional transmission organizations, or RTOs, where utilities can’t easily pass capital and operating costs on to consumers. This has led to soaring future capacity prices in RTO areas such as Pennsylvania, Ohio and Virginia, where capacity prices soared 900% in the recent auction for 2024-25. Meanwhile, virtually all large new nuclear and gas capacity being proposed is in non-RTO areas that still have vertically integrated utilities, chiefly Florida.’
Presented without comment. Clinton on Section 230.
‘“We need national action and sadly, our Congress has been dysfunctional when it comes to addressing these threats to our children. So you’re absolutely right. This should be at the top of every legislative, political agenda. There should be a lot of things done. We should be, in my view, repealing something called section 230, which gave platforms on the internet immunity because they were thought to be just pass-throughs, that they shouldn’t be judged for the content that is posted. But we now know that that was an overly simple view, that if the platforms, whether it’s Facebook or Twitter or X or Instagram or TikTok, whatever they are, if they don’t moderate and monitor the content we lose total control and it’s not just the social and psychological effects it’s real harm, it’s child porn and threats of violence, things that are terribly dangerous.”’
Supreme Court leaves in place two Biden environmental regulations
While the court did not explain its decision, it’s not too hard to imagine that they listened to EPA experts here. Loper wasn’t the end of the world, perhaps.
‘David Doniger, senior attorney at Natural Resources Defense Council, called the two rules critical safeguards and applauded the order leaving them in place. He also looked ahead to the still-undecided challenges to the power plant rule.’