Council Industry Vice Chair and Applied Materials CEO Mike Splinter Featured in New York Times Article

There are two distinct prevailing views of the state of the world economy in the United States today: that of the politicians and that of the private sector leadership.

Politicians tend to see the world as divided into specific locations populated by voters who must be made and kept happy, while CEOs look at the world as a vast market full of unlimited economic opportunity. These executives are nearly unanimous in arguing that the rationale behind outsourcing is the search for highest quality talent at the lowest possible cost.

As discussed in our most recent Competitiveness Index, the weight of intangibles (talent, innovation, etc.) in how competitiveness is measured is dramatically increasing. It is well-known that the U.S. is a historically preferred destination for the world’s talent. Nevertheless, American policymakers must implement measures – such as those outlined in Make: An American Manufacturing Movement – to preserve this advantage as more and more advanced nations are offering incentives to capture a larger share of the world’s talent.

To read the New York Times article on the subject, please click here.