The Information Technology and Innovation Foundation is calling on the Donald Trump Administration to focus on the art of the long-range economic growth policy.
In response to the announcement that President-elect Donald Trump and VP-elect Mike Pence had helped broker a deal to keep Carrier air conditioner jobs in Indiana rather than fleeing to Mexico, ITIF said that working to keep and grow American jobs and companies was the right idea but that "lurching from deal to deal" was not.
ITIF, whose bipartisan board members range from Trump FCC transition team member Jeff Eisenach to Blair Levin, former top aide to Democratic FCC chair Julius Genachowski, downplayed the extreme reactions from both sides.
"Contrary to early reactions from the left and the right, the Carrier deal opens the door to a new approach to U.S. economic growth policy that is sorely needed," said ITIF president Robert Atkinson. "It sets the precedent that growing, attracting, and retaining globally traded, innovation-based industries that are both high-value and pay high wages is central to U.S. economic growth..."
He said that "globally traded, high-value companies that pay high wages are critical for the United States to continue to grow the economy, create more jobs, and increase standards of living."
But the caveat was that needed to be a holistic approach, including federal investment in research and development, workforce training and reforming the corporate tax system. That last was high on Trump's list of campaign pledges.
"[W]e must go beyond individual deals and focus on creating an overall economic ecosystem that incentivizes these companies to call the United States home," Atkinson said.
