ACCE News
2008 National Summit on American Competitiveness held on May 22 in Chicago
Alexandria, VA -
The US Department of Commerce’s second annual National Summit on American Competitiveness was held in Chicago last Thursday, May 22, 2008. High level government officials, CEOs/Chairmen of Fortune 500 companies and Ivy League professors gathered to speculate whether or not the United States will remain on top in the world marketplace. This year’s Summit explored how to bolster the business climate, strengthen the entrepreneurial spirit, and utilize free trade agreements to encourage growth of our companies at home. The Summit also highlighted how states and regions are successfully driving economic transformations and adapting to the challenges of the 21st Century worldwide economy.
Hosted by Secretary of Commerce, Carlos Gutierrez, the Summit consisted of four panel discussions, a keynote address by Richard M. Daley, mayor of Chicago, and a town hall session. The Chicagoland Chamber of Commerce was instrumental in bringing the Summit to Chicago.
The consensus was that the lack of political will in defining federal strategies on improving K-12 education, healthcare, immigration and trade policies will make us noticeably less competitive within 10 years. All leading indicators are pointing in the wrong direction states Intel Chairman, Craig Barrett.
Secretary of Commerce Gutierrez talked about legislation around free trade verses isolation. He said the United States has 11 trade agreements while other countries have considerably larger numbers. We have only 5% of the marketplace (based on population) and there is plenty business to be had outside of the U.S.
Louis Gerstner, retired IBM CEO, is most worried about our education in this country. He said the U.S. will be losing our global position in 10 years if we don’t change how our K-12 schooling is managed. We know more money doesn’t improve a school, better teachers and higher expectations do. The problem is there is no political will to take on the status quo and change the fact that school systems are locally run, with no universal standards and teachers not held accountable nor being paid well.
Boeing Chairman and CEO says that his company spends over $100K per year teaching new recruits skills they should have picked up in high school. It makes business sense to fix the K-12 problem.
Our higher education system is still the best in the world because many are not public institutions. One third of those students in our colleges and universities are foreign born. We import many bright minds from around the world but don’t keep enough of them after graduation.
Harvard Professor Michael Porter said that politics keeps us focused on incremental fixes, i.e. gas tax relief, when we need to build new strategies that will allow us to keep our lead in the world. There has to be a new strategy to improve K-12 education, healthcare, trade and immigration policy.
Deborah Wince-Smith, President, Council on Competitiveness, stated our immigration policy has always been family-based, trying to help families to stay together. We need to be more skill based to attract and retain some of the brightest in the world. She said we also need more vocational training and community colleges to understand and focus programs on the skills needed by the workforce in their community.
Steven Chen, co-founder and chief technology officer of YouTube discussed why he moved to Silicon Valley after college. He said Silicon Valley attracts young innovative entrepreneurs because of the many mentors and business minded people with financing available to help the techie entrepreneurs get started. Innovation clusters around universities and business capital must be nearby to create the entrepreneur growth companies.
One thing all agreed on is that the best companies in America are those that are globally engaged. Tupperware Chairman and CEO, Rick Goings, said 85% of his business is done outside of our borders. Countries have called his company asking them to move into their country and help their women generate an income. Deere & Company Chairman and CEO, Robert Lane and Caterpillar Chairman and CEO James Owens agreed that their companies need free trade to prosper as well as to help them feed the world at a lesser cost.
Secretary of Treasurer Henry Paulson, Jr. talked with state governors about their role in keeping the US strong in a global economy. States like South Carolina have recruiting offices around the world to bring foreign investment to their state. Chicago Mayor Daley talked about how he is competing with London, Paris, Madrid and Beijing in the marketplace, not Milwaukee, St. Louis or Detroit.
The Summit speakers reiterated the lack of political will to move forward in building strategies that will keep us competitive in the world marketplace. The political will is not there because Americans have not been educated enough on what the rest of the world is doing to become more competitive. CEOs of globally engaged companies and some government agencies do know but have not been able to convince the public that our status quo in education, infrastructure, immigration, trade policies and healthcare will not allow us to hold onto our current global position. This reaffirms the fact that chambers, rotary clubs and other civic groups need to help educate the public on the need for strategic change in these areas if Americans want to keep their current standard of living.
Source: ACCE
Publication Date: May 28, 2008