ITIF 10-Year Anniversary Conference: Restoring Investment in America’s Economy

On the occasion of ITIF’s 10-year anniversary, with the generous support of Bernard L. Schwartz, ITIF will hold a half-day conference exploring policy solutions to restore America’s investment-driven economy. The conference will highlight the nature of the challenges the country faces because of inadequate investment, the policy options to turn in a new direction, and the political path to enact a workable strategy.

The most important determinant of long-term economic growth is the rate at which we increase productivity, because it is the key to higher incomes and better living standards. Yet by this metric, U.S. prospects are dim. In fact, the annual growth rate in labor productivity since the Great Recession has been half the rate we achieved in the post-World War II era.

A key reason for the drop has been the simultaneous decline in both public and private investment in the fundamental underpinnings of a dynamic, innovation-oriented economy. To really thrive again, we need to restore robust, sustained increases in public and private investment in four main categories: scientific research, new equipment and machinery, education and skills, and infrastructure.

But rather than address the underlying problem of inadequate investment, policymakers have largely treated our economic malaise either as if it were a business cycle problem that the Federal Reserve can solve through monetary policy or a permanent condition of structural stagnation that we must learn to live with. ITIF does not agree. We believe that by recommitting the country to a strategy of investing in the right fundamentals, we can kick start productivity and increase wages for all Americans.

Agenda

8:00 — 9:00 a.m.: Breakfast

9:00 — 9:40 a.m.: Opening Remarks:

• Rep. Anna Eshoo (D-CA)
• Rep. Darrell Issa (R-CA)
• Robert D. Atkinson, President, ITIF

9:40 — 10:40 a.m.: Panel: Why do we need long-term productivity growth, and what kind of investment do we need to support it?

• Martin Neil Baily, Bernard L. Schwartz Chair in Economic Policy Development, Brookings Institution
• Stephen Cohen, Co-Director, Berkeley Roundtable on the International Economy
• Donald Marron, Director, Economic Policy Initiatives, Urban Institute
• Sam Fleming, U.S. Economics Editor, Financial Times (moderator)

10:55 — 11:55 a.m.: Panel: What kind of policies do we need to restore public and private investment?

• Douglas Holtz-Eakin, President, American Action Forum
• Rosabeth Kanter, Ernest L. Arbuckle Professor of Business Administration, Harvard Business School
• Laura Tyson, Professor of Business Administration and Economics, Haas School of Business, UC Berkeley
• Jim Tankersley, Economic Policy Correspondent, Washington Post (moderator)

12:00 — 12:40 p.m.: Discussion: The political path to an investment economy

• Sen. Chris Coons (D-DE)
• Sen. Cory Gardner (R-CO)
• Robert D. Atkinson, President, ITIF (moderator)

1:00 — 2:00 p.m.: Lunch panel: How will emerging technologies such as machine learning, autonomy, robotics, and 3D printing help drive capital investment?

• Arvind Krishna, Senior Vice President and Director, IBM Research
• Alton Romig, Executive Officer, National Academy of Engineering
• Greg Zacharias, Chief Scientist, U.S. Air Force
• Robert D. Atkinson, President, ITIF (moderator)