Certain people seem to demand that what they do is essential and even if no one wants it anymore then we should all chip in an pay for it. Consist the horse manure collectors in New York City. Now we really did not need them for well over a hundred years an no one demand the "Government" fund their ongoing efforts. Frankly it would make traffic worse and one would guess Congestion Pricing would not apply to them.
Now along comes some privileged Atlantic reporter who states:
Some have called for direct and muscular government intervention. Policy proposals include tax credits for publications that hire reporters and for advertisers that place ads in those publications, as well as increased government spending on public-service ads. A potentially more powerful mechanism: a law compelling Google and Facebook to compensate publishers for the news content the tech companies display on their platforms. Publishers around the world have lined up in support of a law enacted in Australia in 2021 known as the News Media Bargaining Code. The law creates a framework for publishers to negotiate payments from tech giants. Thus far in Australia, the law has resulted in more than $140 million a year in payments, according to the former government official who implemented the bargaining code—a tiny fraction of the $424 billion that Google’s and Facebook’s parent companies collected in revenues last year, but real money to Aussie media companies. The law’s apparent success in supporting journalism has spurred similar proposals in Canada, the United Kingdom, New Zealand, Indonesia, Brazil, Switzerland, and South Africa. California might pass a state-level bargaining code this year. In 2023, Democratic Senator Amy Klobuchar and Republican Senator John Kennedy introduced a federal version. The tech giants themselves, unsurprisingly, have balked; Facebook has blocked news in Canada rather than paying publishers there. Still, even the threat of bargaining codes can nudge tech companies into negotiations that lead to meaningful payments to publishers, according to Anya Schiffrin, who has studied global media incentives as the director of the technology, media, and communications program at Columbia University’s School of International and Public Affairs. “I’m a huge believer in bargaining codes,” she told me. But, she predicted, the Klobuchar-Kennedy bill, despite its long list of bipartisan co-sponsors, is unlikely to become law anytime soon. “The Senate seems to have other things to do,” she said. Among those who wish Congress would act is Soon-Shiong, who responded to criticism from Democratic lawmakers by urging them to pass a law to support news organizations. “I’d like to put the question to them,” he wrote, according to the Times’ own coverage. “What can they do to help preserve a free and robust press, one that is instrumental in upholding our democracy?”
In a free market if no one wants your product you either change or go out of business. No more horses not more horse shoes. But there is now a class of people who firmly believe they are on high and demand we pay even though no one wants them.
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