In January, while naming UCLA’s new technology and research center, Gov. Gavin Newsom had some fairly typical remarks about California’s leadership in tech development: “California is a global The epicenter of innovation – from the creation of the internet to the dominance of artificial intelligence, the future of humanity happens here first.
Yet for so-called innovation hubs, our state certainly doesn’t give innovators a lot of room to try out new ideas. California legislators and regulators are so eager to limit and control any promising new development that we have instead become the poster child for Ronald Reagan’s quote: “If it moves, tax it. If it keeps moving, Just regulate it.
Maybe Newsom and the Democratic Legislature haven’t noticed yet, but California has been facing a tech exodus as many big-name companies head to states that give them more space to create the next wave of promising innovations. Given the state’s reliance on capital gains revenue, this is one reason we now face a budget deficit of $45 billion or more.
On the good news front, tighten base According to the report, the San Francisco Bay Area may be experiencing a technological renaissance based on artificial intelligence systems, with the region receiving “more than 50% of the world’s total venture capital investment in new artificial intelligence-related companies.” But will the state stifle this boom before it takes off? According to the latest action from the Legislature, the answer is “maybe.”
The Senate Appropriations Committee recently approved Senate Bill 915, which would “prioritize local control in decisions to deploy autonomous vehicle services.” In addition to gaining approval from all countries, self-driving taxi companies must also contend with an increasing number of local regulations.
The legislation has been changed to apply to the 15 largest cities and prohibit local bans on self-driving cars, but that doesn’t alleviate my concerns. In any case, this technology is mainly promoted in large cities. It would be easy to kill a technology without banning it outright, say, forcing these companies to face wildly different driving rules in every different city they go to.
Like all cutting-edge innovations, self-driving cars are an ominous and dangerous development for many of us. But most new cars already have various self-driving features (lane assist, adaptive cruise control, blind spot monitoring). Computers are almost certainly better at driving than humans. Nearly 43,000 Americans die in car crashes every year, almost all at the hands of human drivers. According to research from the RAND Corporation, widespread use of self-driving cars could save thousands of lives.
Self-driving cars offer huge benefits to people with disabilities, the elderly, and others who cannot drive or choose not to drive. However, federal, state and local officials worry that as the technology goes through its growing pains, some inevitable hiccups will arise, such as minor accidents and concerns about traffic violations (just as average drivers sometimes don’t violate traffic laws) )).
One advocate for SB 915 expressed concern about robotaxis taking a tricky curve, as if that was a good excuse to add a meaningless hodgepodge of local regulations to the mix. Ironically, state regulators have taken an admirably low-key approach when it comes to self-driving car development. In March, the California Public Utilities Commission granted Waymo, Alphabet Inc.’s self-driving car unit, the ability to expand operations in the Bay Area and Los Angeles areas and even drive on highways at speeds of up to 65 mph. But even if the state takes a sensible approach, locals want to step in and screw up the project.
SB 915 isn’t the only example of the California Legislature’s knee-jerk hostility to innovation. Many states are trying to regulate artificial intelligence technology, but California’s Senate Bill 1047, which passed the Senate and has been moved to the House of Representatives, is undoubtedly the most far-reaching example. The bill would create a new state regulatory agency to oversee artificial intelligence.
Basically, the measure forces AI developers to mitigate all possible harms posed by their technology through “imaginary threats of machines running out of control, computer models running out of control, and other nightmare scenarios that have no basis in reality.” letter of objection. The group is rightly concerned that the measure would undermine California’s leadership in tech.
Last week, I wrote about the Legislature’s efforts to limit the use of artificial intelligence technology in a simple, real-world application — self-checkout lanes. Under the guise of helping stores combat retail theft, Senate Bill 1446 is a union amalgam of efforts to limit the use of the technology to protect union grocery jobs.
So, yes, California has been a center of global innovation, but it’s clearly not going to be that way for much longer. Hopefully Newsom will listen to himself and take out the veto pen.
This column first appeared in the Orange County Register.