Neoliberalism turned our world into a business. And there are two big winners
Fearmongering Donald Trump and optimistic Silicon Valley seem to epitomize opposing ideologies. But the two have far more in common than you think
Tomorrow, Silicon Valley leaders will sit down for a summit with Donald Trump. Larry Page, Tim Cook, Elon Musk, and Sheryl Sandberg are all expected to attend. The agenda is unknown, but the mood is likely to be tense. After all, tech executives overwhelmingly backed Hillary Clinton and loudly railed against the dangers posed by a Trump presidency. And Trump regularly lashed out at Silicon Valley on the campaign trail, bashing the industry for building hardware overseas and importing foreign engineers.
But tech has little to fear from Trump. If his cabinet appointments are any indication, he seems keen to govern as a free-market fundamentalist, cutting taxes and regulations to the bone. Trump's elevation of ultra-hawkish ex-generals to key cabinet posts also suggests that he will aggressively expand the sprawling surveillance state inherited from Obama. This is excellent news for companies like Palantir, which sell data analytics tools to the CIA, the NSA and other agencies. Palantir was co-founded by Peter Thiel, the billionaire who broke with his Silicon Valley colleagues to embrace Trump. Thiel now sits on the transition team, and has begun drawing a select circle of tech industry allies into Trump's orbit. He and his friends are likely to make lots of money.
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