Our Work
Where tech meets housing and labor
We’re addressing how tech intersects with the most consequential areas of the economy for everyday people: where they live (housing) and the conditions under which they work (labor).
Tech plays a significant role in determining these outcomes, and we want to see tech bring about prosperity, not exacerbate harm.
Intersections
While housing and labor are the two vertical areas where we focus, there are several important aspects that cut across those issues to which we pay particular attention:
Power and information asymmetries enable exploitative applications of tech. Companies collect massive amounts of data that aren’t shared back with the people from whom they collect that data. We need to ensure that data is collected responsibly and in a way that protects individual privacy. Wherever possible, we want to foster transparency in this data-driven economy.
We know that inequities don’t begin and end with tech companies or the products they build. Venture capital, the economic structure that drives the industry, incentivizes many of the harmful practices we address. The winners-take-all, growth-at-all-costs approach that venture capital demands not only contributes to the erosion of labor standards and speculation in the housing market, it also crowds out more aligned sources of capital that could fund world-positive tech breakthroughs in these areas. Simply put, to tackle inequities in tech, we need to follow the money.
AI is poised to change the entire tech landscape—and with it, the global economy. Generative AI, automation, and algorithms are making their way into every facet of life, from housing and healthcare to elections and workplaces. We need bold, comprehensive AI policy to ensure its responsible deployment across sectors.
Technology is most useful when it is designed based on real people’s needs. People need a seat at the table when it comes to the tools that determine their economic prospects. Impacted people should be integral to every step of a product’s creation, from research to design to development to deployment. Similarly, people should be central to the process of regulating those products, from research to policy to implementation.
Geography
While our work has national and global implications, we are of and from Silicon Valley’s backyard. We believe our work can have the most impact when it is done in the tech industry’s birthplace: California. As the fifth-largest economy in the world, the home of most of the largest global tech companies, and a place where bold policy change is possible, we believe operating in California allows us to have an outsized impact that scales beyond our borders.
We see both tech and California as bellwethers. The changes made in tech and in California law have ripple effects beyond industry and borders. By starting with people-first policy in California, we can shape tech practices at their source, creating impacts across borders. To enable the spread of these ideas, we develop deep partnerships with organizations representing communities impacted by technology around the globe to advance and strengthen our collective vision for responsible tech.
Partnership + collaboration
Our work is most powerful when it’s done in partnership with others. We sit at the intersection of many movements and organizations that are doing important and interrelated work to build economic equity. Since our earliest days, we’ve viewed our role as bridge builders between our movement partners, the tech community, researchers, impacted people, and community members who are pursuing a more equitable economy and a more accountable tech industry. This spirit of collaboration is infused throughout all of our work.
Our advocacy partners
This work isn’t possible without our network of passionate, committed partners.
