What Does It Mean to be Competitive?

Developing a plan to improve the economy is an enormous challenge. In fact, it would be a whole lot easier to put together a Chicago Cubs team that will win the World Series. But we have never been a country that backed away from a challenge, so in the spirit of better competition, I will continue to blog ahead. And for those politicians who might accidentally read this, I will define exactly what I mean when I say that I want America to be more competitive.

I have devoted a fair amount of blog space this past year to the cause of making North American moldmakers and molders more competitive in the global marketplace. Both of the major U.S. political parties have also spent a lot of time and money trying to convince voters that they too want to make America more competitive. But our country and our economy are big, diverse and dynamic. Developing a plan to improve the economy is an enormous challenge. In fact, it would be a whole lot easier to put together a Chicago Cubs team that will win the World Series.

But we have never been a country that backed away from a challenge, so in the spirit of better competition, I will continue to blog ahead. And for those politicians who might accidentally read this, I will define exactly what I mean when I say that I want America to be more competitive.

The definition of a competitive country is as follows (courtesy of the Harvard Business School):

The U.S. is a competitive location to the extent that companies operating in this country are able to compete successfully in the global economy while supporting high and rising living standards for the average American. A competitive location produces prosperity for both companies and citizens.

You will note the last part about both companies and citizens. It seems that in their efforts to promote competition, the Republicans and the Democrats have chosen to divide these two groups rather than combine them. That may be the best way for the politicians to keep their jobs, but it does not seem to be a good way for many of us ordinary citizens to keep our jobs. You see, a fractious government certainly generates a lot of donations to the various candidates and the PAC’s that support them, but it has become a huge impediment to making our country’s manufacturing base more competitive.

In the coming weeks I will offer some concrete initiatives that the policymakers should consider, as well as some suggestions for business leaders and citizens. We can fix the economy if we choose to do so.