2024 State Legislative and Policy Preview

11 things I'll be watching at the state level this year.

Photo credit: Dave Winer

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Happy 2024 everyone! The arrival of the new year means new state legislative sessions are either already underway or set to start over the next few weeks, so it’s time for my annual state legislative and policy preview.

This year is going to be a weird one at the state level because it’s an election year. The presidential circus and each state’s respective presidential primary or caucus is going to suck up a disproportionate amount of media attention — even as many state legislators and attorneys general are themselves up for re-election — and state legislative sessions are going to be even shorter than normal, because politicians want to be out on the campaign trail with elections looming, not sitting in committee hearings under the capitol dome.

A lot is still going to happen, to be sure; it’s just going to happen on a much quicker schedule, and probably with less press time and attention than the already scant resources devoted to state capitals. With that in mind, below are 11 things that I will be watching with particular interest, and can hopefully convey enough useful information to all of you about.

My usual caveats apply: Circumstances can change quickly and with them political and policy priorities, so don’t take any predictions here as written in stone. And of course I missed some stuff, because this is a big country. But you can check my previews from the last two years here and here — not too bad, I think!

1. States aim to trash junk fees: Last year, California passed a broad ban on so-called “junk fees” — those ridiculous “processing” or “convenience” fees that pop up on everything from live events tickets to hotel rooms to utility bills to car rentals — and a ban in select industries also passed the Pennsylvania House with a massive bipartisan majority. I expect many more states to take aim at this pernicious corporate practice this year — bills have already been introduced in Arizona and New York — especially because the Biden Administration is leaning hard into the issue. These state-level bills call for what’s known as “all in pricing,'“ which means the full price of the product needs to be disclosed upfront, so shoppers can make an informed decision, not click on a product they think is $40 and turns out to be $95 once fees are tacked on.

2. Hospital mergers stay in the spotlight: No issue generated as much incoming from state leaders for me last year as hospital mergers. Giant health systems are gobbling up facilities, which the research shows results in worse care for patients and a worse working environment for employees. Minnesota in 2023 passed an excellent new law to rein in hospital mergers, and there’s already a similar bill that’s been re-introduced in Washington State. I think that sort of legislation will only increase in popularity, as will calls for state attorneys general, alongside the Federal Trade Commission, to block proposed hospital mergers. Alongside that, there’s been increasing interest in what’s known as “corporate practice of medicine” laws, which are meant to prevent corporate ownership of health care facilities, which could also result in new legislation or state enforcement of existing law.

3. Fighting rental housing algorithms: I wrote about the D.C. attorney general’s case against a corporation called RealPage that uses software to fix rental housing prices amongst D.C. landlords, essentially creating a cartel and driving up costs for renters. The Department of Justice has also joined a private antitrust suit against RealPage in federal court in Tennessee. I’d expect to see more enforcement actions against this sort of price-fixing in rental housing, and perhaps even some legislative movement to ban it outright, as well as more attention to the role of similar collusion in markets ranging from agriculture to hotel rooms. With interest rates still pretty high (meaning home buying is off the menu for many folks) and lots of especially urban areas in a housing squeeze, this sort of issue has a lot of both practical and political salience.

4. Ticketmaster can’t shake it off: Ticketmaster earned a lot of bad press last year for bungling the sale of tickets to Taylor Swift’s “Eras” tour, leading to a flurry of bills across the country meant to rein in its worst practices. Ticketmaster would, of course, get pulled into any of the proposed junk fee bans I detailed above, but I’d also expect more legislation aimed at ticketing markets in general, such as regulating whether bots can be used to buy tickets and what sort of fees can apply on secondary ticketing sites such as Stubhub. I especially like a bill that already passed the California Senate unanimously that would ban the exclusivity deals Ticketmaster demands with venues; that’ll move over to the California Assembly this year. Also keep an eye our for a potential case from the Department of Justice to break up Ticketmaster and LiveNation.

5. Google’s many days in court: Late last year, Google lost an antitrust case about its app store policies; this year, a judge will decide what Google needs to do to fix its illegal behavior. But that’s just the beginning: Google faces closing arguments in May in a case from DoJ alleging it has an illegal monopoly over internet searches. It will be in court again in the first half of the year facing a different DoJ charge that it has illegally monopolized the market for digital advertising. (State AGs have also filed a digital advertising case against Google, but that won’t be heard until early 2025.) The way in which these cases shake out not only carries big implications for Google specifically, but tech policy in general, as legislators and other enforcers will certainly be watching and acting to either apply or codify positive outcomes in their own jurisdictions, or fix any hash that the judiciary makes.

6. Protecting kids, and all of us, from Big Tech: Separately but somewhat connected to the previous point, there will be a lot of legislation in 2024 to try to mitigate the harms of Big Tech, especially on children. A recent study found that social media corporations alone made $11 billion in advertising revenue from children in 2022. Several states have already passed some version of laws either requiring age verification for certain websites and apps or preventing certain kinds of content or advertising from being presented to minors. Montana even outright banned TikTok (a decision that is now pending in court). Other states, such as New York, Minnesota, Pennsylvania, and New Jersey, are also taking what I think is the better approach, attempting to reform antitrust law more broadly to rein in or outlaw the harmful business models employed by Big Tech that lead those firms to try to addict children to their products in the first place.

7. More billion-dollar stadium boondoggles: Alas, the era of the billion dollar public subsidy for sports stadiums is here, and I think the pernicious public subsidizing of sports facilities will get worse before it gets better. There will be a battle in the Virginia-DC-Maryland area over a proposed plan for the Washington Wizards and Capitals to move to the Virginia suburbs, as well as over a future home for the NFL’s Washington Commanders. Other team owners are surely going to see that billion is the new normal and act accordingly, playing states off against each other to get their own deals. The only silver lining I can see is that if the Wizards/Capitals plan is defeated in the Virginia General Assembly, or if the campaign to overturn a massive subsidy given to the Oakland Athletics to move to Las Vegas is somehow successful, it would send a signal that the owners have gone too far. But those are big asks.

8. Right to Repair keeps on rising: The “right to repair” movement — a wide ranging campaign to ensure that consumers can access the necessary information, tools, and parts needed to fix the stuff they purchase — has notched some solid wins, passing laws or getting referendums approved in New York, Minnesota, California, Maine, and Colorado. Right to repair is a hugely popular issue that voters love, for good reason: Powerful corporations shouldn’t be allowed to deny us the ability to fix things we already own. I expect right to repair wins to keep mounting, as even big corporations such as Apple are seeing the writing on the wall and backing down.

9. The Kroger-Albertsons merger comes to a head: Kroger and Albertsons have proposed what would be, if approved, the largest merger in retail grocer history. The Federal Trade Commission should decide this month whether it will sue to block the merger, and several state attorneys general, including those in Minnesota, Arizona, and Nevada, have been closely scrutinizing it as well. California’s AG already confirmed he’s actively considering trying to block the merger. I think the merger would be a disaster for workers and shoppers, so hope all of this talk moves to action over the next few weeks.

10. More states take on noncompetes and training debt agreements: Last year, Minnesota became the fourth state to broadly ban all noncompete agreements — which prevent workers from taking a new job in their chosen field — joining California, North Dakota, and Oklahoma. New York would have done the same if Gov. Kathy Hochul hadn’t ceded to a corporate campaign based on pure nonsense and vetoed a bill that passed the legislature there. I expect the New York bill to be back this year, with a larger coalition backing it, and for more states to not only look at broader noncompete bans, but to also look to ban agreements that force employees to repay often onerous training costs if they want to leave their job, which functions as a noncompete in all but name.

11. Utility political scandals get a response: There have been a spate of political scandals involving utility corporations in recent years, so, as I explained here, there’s been a growing push to restrict their ability to participate in the political process, and in particular to prevent them from using customer money to engage in lobbying for the very measures that often hurt customers. Colorado, Maine, and Connecticut passed new regulations on utility political spending and lobbying last year, and New York and Ohio — and I’m betting some others — will consider legislation this year.

If you’re interested in one of these efforts in your state and want to learn how to get involved, drop a comment below or send me a message. Do the same if you don’t see your state anywhere and want to try to get something introduced in your statehouse.

Also, please remember that your state legislators and attorneys general really matter, so don’t let the 2024 election come and go without seriously scrutinizing those candidates.

Finally, thanks as always for reading and subscribing, and here’s to an exciting and eventful 2024.

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— Pat Garofalo