Casten Urges Congress to Revive Office of Technology Assessment
Washington, D.C. – U.S. Representative Sean Casten (IL-06), member of the House Financial Services Committee, testified before the U.S. House Committee on Appropriations to fund and restore the Office of Technology Assessment (OTA), a Capitol Hill technology agency that was defunded more than 20 years ago. Funding OTA would provide Congressional Members and Committees with an objective analysis of emerging technology.
A video of Congressman Casten's testimony can be found here.
Congressman Casten testifies before the U.S. House Appropriations Committee on restoring OTA
A full transcript of his remarks, as prepared for delivery, are below:
"Thank you, Chairman Ryan and Ranking Member Herrera Beutler, for providing members the opportunity to share our thoughts on the FY20 appropriations bill for the Legislative Branch.
When I graduated with an M.S. in Chemical Engineering in 1998, my first job was as a technology consultant at Arthur D. Little, working in their energy practice. Our clients ranged from government agencies (US and Foreign) to Fortune 500 Companies to technology startups. In all cases, our work was to evaluate technologies and strategies relating to alternative energy. Over the course of 2 years at the firm, I worked on comparative analysis of emerging battery chemistries, evaluated the cost and emissions signature of various transportation fuel chains, advised governments on the codes and standards developments required for a hydrogen delivery infrastructure, and tried (unsuccessfully) to persuade auto manufacturers that they should market the fun acceleration of their electric vehicles rather than their limited range.
My work as a consultant required some original research but often depended on reviewing existing technical analyses. Among those sources that I relied upon, the reports prepared by the Congressional Office of Technology Assessment (OTA) were among the most technically rigorous, dispassionate, and comprehensive on a wide array of technologies. Unlike other sources, OTA Reports provided clear overviews of how technologies worked and the key obstacles to their commercialization, and were free of bias.
However, it also soon became apparent that OTA reports stopped a few years before my job started. When I asked my boss how to get more current reports, so as to ensure that I wasn't unduly relying on stale information he told me that "Gingrich killed the OTA. It's too bad for you because you have to do the research now, but it's great for the firm because now instead of our customers getting the information for free, they have to hire us to do them."
OTA was enacted by Congress in 1972. As laid out in law OTA's mission was "to provide early indications of the probable beneficial and adverse impacts of the applications of technology and to develop other coordinate information which may assist the Congress." In this mission, OTA built a team of skilled researchers well equipped to reach into the private sector and government to assess the practical impacts of emerging technologies and their long-term ramifications. Such analysis not only allowed members of Congress to be better informed but also provided useful frameworks to facilitate proactive policymaking – something which this body struggles to accomplish today.
The absence of the OTA is even more disconcerting given the astounding rate at which new technologies, innovations, and industries have developed over the last two and a half decades since the OTA was shuttered which shows no evidence of slowing. Today, we face a barrage of complex issues brought on by an unprecedented level of technological disruption across all aspects of life. We would not expect members of Congress to rely on outside, non-independent groups to evaluate the fiscal impacts of proposed legislation. Similarly, we should not expect Congress to independently evaluate the thermodynamic, physical, or manufacturing cost constraints of new technologies.
From Smartgrids to gene editing, from cryptocurrency to autonomous vehicles, Congress simply cannot do its job without the kind of objective, rigorous analysis that OTA once provided.
And yet today, Congress is left to rely on lobbyists and NGOs for this information, many of whom have a vested interest in providing Congress with information that is incomplete or otherwise biased. Without a truly nonpartisan and responsive source for information, Congressional oversight of Executive agencies and the private sector becomes increasingly fraught, less informed, and driven by partisan ideologies instead of reliable facts.
Each of us who serve in Congress brings a unique perspective and expertise which informs how we serve our constituents. I am confident of my ability to evaluate energy technologies and their impact on our economy and environment. But I cannot claim expertise on cybersecurity, cryptocurrencies, or gene-drive technologies. I, like most of my colleagues, rely on own research, my staff, committee staff, and a litany of other resources like CRS, GAO, CBO, and others to inform my thinking on these issues. These are useful resources, but woefully insufficient. It frustrates me that we recognize the value of that impartial, reliable analysis when funding the CBO, but have thus far failed to recognize it for an agency that would address some of the most complex issues we face as a chamber and a society.
I still can't quite fathom how it is that 20 years after my first introduction to the OTA, it has never been resuscitated. This has made Congress less informed and cheapened public policy. How many technologies with truly revolutionary potential have we funded at the expense of less useful dead ends? How many young engineers, with a job like I had 20 years ago, look at our funding priorities – or witness hearings – and conclude that we just don't get it? The answer is more than we'd like to admit.
If we still had the OTA, we would have a rich resource of public data that would not only shed light on these commercialization gaps but could also help policymakers grapple with these shortcomings and where it serves the public interest, provide better supports to these industries. Yet, in the absence OTA, we are left with researchers having to tilt at the same windmills in perpetuity, forever "rediscovering" things we knew 20 years ago at a higher cost to all parties involved.
For these reasons, I would respectfully urge this committee to strongly consider restoring funding to the Office of Technology Assessment (OTA) when developing the FY20 appropriations bill for the Legislative Branch."