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Commentary

Setting the Policy Agenda on Innovation Issues

  • Alongside our in-depth policy reports, ITIF’s long-running Innovation Files blog serves as a forum where analysts provide quick takes, quips, and commentary on the latest in technology and innovation policy.
  • Other blogs from ITIF include In the Arena, Rob Atkinson’s notes on the battle of ideas (also on Substack at policyarena.org), plus special series, such as The Brussels Effect, examining how the EU exports its regulatory agenda; Defending Digital, examining spurious critiques of the tech industry; and Innovate4Health, covering the intersection between intellectual property and life sciences innovation.
  • ITIF analysts also frequently contribute op-eds and commentary pieces to leading publications around the world.

February 9, 2026|Blogs

The United States Needs Permanent Space Stations

Congress confirmed Jared Isaacman to lead NASA in late 2025. He should begin his tenure by finalizing NASA’s plan to transition from the ISS to commercial space stations, because the United States must maintain a presence in low-earth orbit to remain competitive.

February 9, 2026|Blogs

America’s Cyber Withdrawal Needs a Replacement

The Trump administration’s withdrawal from international cybersecurity forums like the GFCE and Hybrid CoE risks creating gaps in global coordination, early warning, and norm-setting. Strategic disengagement must be paired with replacement mechanisms to preserve multilateral cyber capacity, maintain allied cohesion, and safeguard U.S. interests.

February 9, 2026|Blogs

Fact of the Week: Industries Impacted by a Quasi-Robot Tax in South Korea Reduced Industrial Robot Installations by 28 Percent

After South Korea reduced its tax credit for automation in 2018 from 7 percent to 3 percent for large firms, South Korean industries, on average, reduced robot installations by 28 percent compared with their Japanese counterparts.

February 7, 2026|Op-Eds & Contributed Articles

New Research Shows Teen Social Media Bans Might Not Be the Answer

Ash Johnson writes in The Hill that teen social media bans are based on moral panic rather than evidence, misdiagnose screen time as the harm, and should be replaced with nuanced, evidence-based policies that empower parents, incentivize safer platform design, and target specific, demonstrable risks.

February 6, 2026|Blogs

Washington Should Draw a Line in the Sand on Korea to Defend U.S. Tech Leadership

The House Judiciary Committee has launched an investigation into South Korea's discriminatory targeting of U.S. tech companies, particularly Coupang, marking an important escalation in Washington's pushback against non-tariff attacks that use regulatory measures to weaken American technology leadership. These attacks—which have cost U.S. tech companies over $30 billion globally in the past decade—disproportionately target American firms through fines, operational restrictions, and forced infrastructure investments while creating openings for Chinese competitors.

February 6, 2026|Blogs

Europe’s DSA Puts an Unfair Target on American Tech Companies

The EU’s Digital Services Act (DSA) imposes the heaviest regulatory burdens on large platforms in a way that overwhelmingly targets U.S. technology companies, exposing them to disproportionate compliance costs and fines while largely sparing European firms. This discriminatory model functions as a non-tariff attack that risks weakening U.S. innovation and competitiveness, and is now being replicated globally, amplifying the strategic challenge for American tech leadership.

February 6, 2026|Blogs

American Culture and the Decline of the Digital Spirit: Part I

Culture matters. Just as England’s discomfort with industrialization weakened its economy, today’s U.S. elite skepticism risks becoming a collective headwind against digital progress.

February 5, 2026|Op-Eds & Contributed Articles

Plea for Transatlantic Ties, Not Technological Autarky

In a letter to the Financial Times, Daniel Castro argues that Europe’s push for “digital sovereignty,” exemplified by France replacing Zoom and Teams with a domestic platform, risks fragmenting the transatlantic digital ecosystem and weakening security and efficiency, and that true resilience comes from interoperable systems, shared rules, and cooperation among allied countries.

February 4, 2026|Op-Eds & Contributed Articles

The Sane Insanity of Digital Sovereignty

Matthew Kilcoyne in World Commerce Review argues that Europe’s pursuit of digital sovereignty risks fragmenting the digital economy and weakening innovation, and instead calls for coordinated, interoperable infrastructure, open data flows, and shared standards to preserve scale, efficiency, and economic growth.

February 4, 2026|Op-Eds & Contributed Articles

Productivity, Not Flag Waving, Should Drive Canada’s Digital Strategy

Canada should prioritize boosting productivity through the adoption of advanced technologies across its firms and governments, rather than pursuing domestic ownership of existing infrastructure in the name of “digital sovereignty.”

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