policy recommendations

The White House recently released Capturing Domestic Competitive Advantage in Advanced Manufacturing, a blueprint intended to serve as a national framework for the sustainable resurgence in advanced manufacturing in the United States. The report was written by the Advanced Manufacturing Partnership (AMP) steering committee, a national public-private partnership formed by the Obama administration in 2011 to help increase public and private investments in advanced manufacturing and create high-paying manufacturing jobs. The report outlines a set of 16 recommendations around three pillars — enabling innovation, securing the talent pipeline and improving the business climate. For a sustainable resurgence in advanced manufacturing, the report's authors contend that the government and industry must work together with a sustained focus, aligned interests and coordinated actions to adopt the report's proposed recommendations. Recommendations include:

Foreign-born inventors and entrepreneurs play a vital role in the U.S. innovation economy, yet these individuals face many obstacles if they wish to remain in the country. Last year, more than three-quarters of all patents at the top ten patent-producing universities had at least one foreign-born inventor, according to report from the Partnership for a New American Economy. The report lays out several policy changes that could help the country retain more foreign-born innovators trained at U.S. universities and is the latest in a series of publications that have emphasized the importance of immigrants in the high-tech economy.

A new report from the National Academies' National Research Council urges the U.S. federal government, state government, business and universities to act in concert to preserve the competitiveness of the nation's research universities. The report, a follow-up to 2005's Rising Above the Gathering Storm, suggests that a number of ongoing trends threaten U.S. global leadership in higher education. The most critical of these issues are declining federal funding for university research and the erosion of state support for higher education in general. By restoring university funding, easing regulatory and reporting requirements, building stronger university-business research partnerships and addressing attrition rates within graduate programs, the U.S. can restore its national research ecosystem, according to the report.

Governments of advanced economies are starting to believe as the 21st century advances significant opportunities for their technology-based product and service sectors will emerge from increasingly open, competitive and affluent global markets. To compete in this changing world, they are looking to expand access to capital for startups and entrepreneurs, support their research and development (R&D) infrastructure and address weaknesses in their national economies. Canada, the United Kingdom and the European Union (EU) are among those that recently have announced initiatives or released reports intended to strength their national innovation economy.

U.S. immigration policies are irrational and undirected according to a new report from the Partnership for a New American Economy and Partnership for New York City — Not Coming To America: Why the U.S. is Falling Behind in the Global Race for Talent. In sharp contrast, to attract immigrants that drive economic growth and increase international competitiveness, foreign countries have adopted targeted and strategic policies that include:

Although the U.S. has been at the forefront of the life sciences revolution, a lack of sustained federal funding in biomedical research and intensified competition are threatening its global leadership, finds a new report from the Information Technology and Innovation Foundation (ITIF). Another problem for the U.S. is a lack of consistency and predictability in the level of biomedical research funding — particularly through the National Institutes of Health (NIH). For example, while the 2009 American Recovery and Reinvestment Act provided a temporary increase in NIH funding, a scheduled sequestration in January 2013 would slash NIH funding by at least 7.8 percent, the report states. This boom-bust cycle causes uncertainty and makes it difficult for researchers or businesses to make long-term planning and investment decisions.

Two common themes emerged in a trio of reports aimed at growing the bioscience sectors in Indiana, New York and Pennsylvania: the need for a sustained financial commitment from the states and the importance of a shared vision and better communication between policymakers and industry leaders. In all three reports, the authors say the payoff is big for the states. The bioscience and life science industries support high-wage jobs and attract significant federal funds.

For the third year in a row, technology startups met or exceeded their revenue targets according to Startup Outlook 2012 — a new survey from the Silicon Valley Bank. Nearly 64 percent of surveyed startup executives said revenue performance in 2011 was at or above target levels. This will lead to jobs with eight out of 10 companies surveyed intending to hire in 2012.

As global economies shift, developing nations are attempting to transition as suppliers of raw materials to nations that are producers of value-added goods. Africa has been a major supplier of raw materials to the developed world. However, it drastically lagged behind in the production of valued-added goods. Recently, African nations have attempted to reinvent their economic development efforts from suppliers to producers by developing programs to grow tech-based economies. Two recent initiatives, the LIONS@FRICA Partnership and South Africa's manufacturing incentives program, highlight the changing attitudes on the continent. In addition, a new survey of European business leaders found discouraging results relative to European Union policies to improve innovation.

A large majority of U.S. manufacturing jobs are located in large metropolitan areas, according to a new paper from the Brookings Institution Metropolitan Policy Program. In 2010, about 79.5 percent of manufacturing employment was centered in large metros and in central metropolitan counties. Over the past two years, however, there has been a slight shift in manufacturing activity back towards non-metro areas, as U.S. manufacturing has experienced a small resurgence. On the whole, the move towards metropolitan areas since 1980 has been healthy for the national economy, since it has allowed different cities to develop specialized industry clusters, according to the report.