This is extremely useful feedback and if you have any more comments like this, please share!
I think this is a case where the explanation of the common application is unclear or incomplete and this is causing confusion.
There’s several visions or patterns of how a common application could work and be effective. None of the problematic activities in the FTC link are involved in any version.
Note that in all visions of the common application that I think are viable, the original EA orgs control hiring and salary. Also, at least in a technical sense, candidates do not have to use the common application (although by design, it’s intended to be optimal to do so).
A lot of the value of the common application involves carefully designed sharing of candidate information. This occurs right now, constantly, across most major EA organizations in an informal way.
Technically, many of the activities in the common application is an extension of this (although it would be far more systematic).
Note that I think that anti trust requires a legal theory of harm, like deliberate suppression of salaries or career progress for the benefit of a cartel. If an institution tries to (weakly) improve everyone’s outcomes, that is not the same legal theory.
There’s probably many other legal issues and potential snags with a large common application and a lot of attention to these is important.
Mauricio mentioned in this comment that something like this could run into problems with antitrust law. https://www.ftc.gov/system/files/documents/public_statements/992623/ftc-doj_hr_red_flags.pdf
Neither of us are lawyers, and I certainly have no idea if this is true. But perhaps something to think about.
This is extremely useful feedback and if you have any more comments like this, please share!
I think this is a case where the explanation of the common application is unclear or incomplete and this is causing confusion.
There’s several visions or patterns of how a common application could work and be effective. None of the problematic activities in the FTC link are involved in any version.
Note that in all visions of the common application that I think are viable, the original EA orgs control hiring and salary. Also, at least in a technical sense, candidates do not have to use the common application (although by design, it’s intended to be optimal to do so).
A lot of the value of the common application involves carefully designed sharing of candidate information. This occurs right now, constantly, across most major EA organizations in an informal way.
Technically, many of the activities in the common application is an extension of this (although it would be far more systematic).
Note that I think that anti trust requires a legal theory of harm, like deliberate suppression of salaries or career progress for the benefit of a cartel. If an institution tries to (weakly) improve everyone’s outcomes, that is not the same legal theory.
There’s probably many other legal issues and potential snags with a large common application and a lot of attention to these is important.