Enterprise Policy

Although the seven values of the American Business Creed were widely accepted in the 1950s, two have eroded over time, driven largely by changes in business itself.

Stephen Ezell sat down with Prof. Mahesh Panchagnula to explore the realities of innovation and entrepreneurship.

Daniel Castro sat down with Quinn Taber to explore how the United States is moving away from a free market toward one where the government actively directs investment in critical industries.

The Trump administration doubled down on its push for the federal government to take financial stakes or other commercial interests in major U.S. companies—a policy that would weaken American competitiveness, invite political manipulation, and undermine the very goals of U.S. industrial strategy.

For 40 years, the U.S. government sent implicit and often explicit messages to American firms: Invest in China. Indulging in emotionally satisfying corporate blame points us toward the wrong solutions.

To beat China, the U.S. must revitalize many of the core principles in the 1950s business creed and foster a business community that embraces a national industrial strategy.

Korea’s highly educated workforce is increasingly stuck in low-quality jobs. This is not due to a lack of skill, but rather to government policies that penalize growth and fragment markets. Korea must embrace size neutrality, reforming regulations and incentives to support firms that innovate, scale, and compete globally.

Canada has zero entries among the world’s top 50 science and tech clusters. Waterloo is the best candidate for elevation. To make that happen, the federal and Ontario governments should create an incentive: Tech start-ups based in Waterloo, as well as firms outside Canada that relocate meaningful R&D and innovation production to the region, will pay no tax for a decade.

In reality, we live in a global economy that requires large, integrated firms to advance national success. That means embracing multinationals, not demonizing them.

Assuming the Trump administration is serious about shrinking government, why not eliminate an agency whose sole purpose is to distort market outcomes by privileging firm size over performance and productivity? When it comes to government waste, the Small Business Administration is low-hanging fruit that has been over-ripe for a long time.