How the US private sector is pointing the way to maintain the American Competitiveness

In a recent article entitled “Competitiveness and Innovation“, the United States Council for International Business (USCIB) claims the following:

The US private sector is the primary source of innovation and technology.
Innovation and technologies will help to address our current and future most pressing challenges.

Because of the above, US companies require access to critical markets, resources and talent. To gain this access, the USCIB establishes two groups of requests:

Tax policies as a tool to promote US competitiveness
Policies that foster new information and communications technologies.

The list is concise and can be consulted clicking on the link above.

In short, what the USCIB is asking for is a small and very efficient government that will facilitate the activity of the private sector without unnecessary encumbrance.

This “reminder” of the need for clear horizons to develop businesses appears when President Trump’s administration is deploying an even more aggressive tone against China ahead of the coming elections.

The US has always appeared among the most competitive countries in the world. In the WEF yearly Global Competitiveness Index for the 5 years period 2015-2019, the US has been in the 3rd position 2015 in 2015 and 2016, 2nd in 2017 and 2019, and the first, the most competitive country in the world in 2018. It is early to see how the events of this year will damage this ranking. Still, an alternative classification produced by the Swiss IMD World Competitiveness Center drops the competitiveness of the US from position 3 in 2018 to 10 in 2020.

Under these circumstances, the USCIB claims gain weight. It is not possible to spur competitiveness with barriers to trade, talent and resources. China, the other side of this commercial war coin, equally loses six places, dropping to the 20th position.

The scores obtained by the US have been, historically, remarkable. Year after year, these lists tend to see their first positions filled by small countries. It seems logical to consider smaller countries more attentive, flexible and adaptable to the changing circumstances of our society. For this reason, the stable recurring podium position of the US is a good example that also the biggest countries, with the right perspective, can reach the highest levels of competitiveness.

The interference of the US government (of any government) with overwrought burdens and obstructions to the flow of people, products and financial resources , results in a negative outcome for the economic evolution of the country. Under another focus, this learning also constitutes an essential alert for the European Governments, much more propense than their US peer to regulate every centimeter of activity.