Should Tech Companies Be Political? – Recording
This past year, we’ve seen how tech giants have started to get involved in the political realm more explicitly. Just this year, Uber, Lyft, and Postmates poured $110 million into their Prop 22 campaign. Other companies, like Coinbase, banned politics in their workplace. With a growing affordability crisis in the Bay Area and beyond, many of us are wondering, what should be the role of tech companies in politics?
On Thursday, December 10th at noon we discussed how tech companies have engaged in political issues—or not. We talked through tech’s impact on social and political issues, and how tech workers can promote healthy civic engagement.
The conversation was moderated by Catherine Bracy, Executive Director & Co-Founder of TechEquity. Panelists included:
- Assemblymember David Chiu, 17th District
- Zack Rosen, CEO at Pantheon
- Ulysses J. Smith, Head of Diversity, Inclusion & Belonging at Blend
- Kurt Nelson, Senior Software Engineer at Uber and author of the op-ed I’m a software engineer at Uber and I’m voting against Prop 22.