IRVING, TEXAS – The Institute for Policy Innovation (IPI) today released new polling, demonstrating that while 50% of Texans see inflation as the biggest issue facing America today, they overwhelmingly believe current efforts to regulate the tech industry will lead to higher consumer prices. Not only do Texans believe more regulation will raise prices, they also feel that Congress does not understand how tech companies work well enough to regulate them (64%).
“Texans don’t see tech regulation as important or as a priority for Congress,” said Tom Giovanetti, President of the Institute for Policy Innovation. “Voters across the political spectrum want Congress to concentrate on addressing pocketbook issues like the rising cost of living before regulating an industry that they find generally makes their lives easier.”
In addition to the role tech regulation plays in rising costs, poll results show that Texans believe more government regulation will lead to discrimination of certain viewpoints online. Texans consider user private data protection and protecting children from predators online as the most important issues facing the tech industry and government regulators.
Additional key findings from the poll show:
- Texans overwhelmingly (69%) believe America is on the wrong track.
- 50% of Texan voters say inflation and the cost of living are the biggest issues facing America today.
- Democrat and Republican Texans agree that protecting data, protecting children and protecting against cyberattacks are the most important issues facing tech today.
- Texans favorably view tech companies like Amazon (71% favorable), Google (70% favorable) and Apple (65% favorable).
- 43% of Texans believe their U.S. Senators and Representatives should vote against regulating tech companies.
The poll was conducted in Texas with registered voters between August 30 - September 4, 2022 and was a mix of web panels and text-to-web polling with a margin of error of +/- 3.9 percentage points.