Reports & Briefings

By uniting strategy, promotion, and regulation in a single law, South Korea has given itself a powerful instrument to shape AI—but its blunt regulatory mandates threaten to drag down the very strengths that make the act ambitious.

The mounting economic costs of burdensome regulations that exact far more costs than benefits on societies—and which in many countries have led to unchecked regulatory accumulation—and the adverse impact on innovation, productivity, and long-term growth they cause.

This report ranks more than 200 regions across Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Mexico, Peru, and the United States on 13 commonly available indicators of innovation competitiveness, and offers policymakers a guide to bolstering regional and national innovation capacity.

Chinese electric vehicle makers have benefited from aggressive state-sponsored mercantilist policies that have enabled them to produce lower-cost vehicles than foreign competitors can. They should not be allowed to manufacture their products in the United States.

Cutting federal investments in R&D may appear to save billions in the budget, but it could cost the economy trillions. In fact, ITIF estimates that cutting federal R&D by 20 percent would cost the U.S. economy up to almost $1.5 trillion compared with China’s growth pace.

Congress should reform and refocus the Universal Service Fund. It spends too much money, prioritizes the wrong problems, and funds it all with a high, sector-specific tax rate. Congress should reduce the overall size of the program and fund it with general revenue.

Beijing has provided significant support to its domestic polysilicon industry in a drive to establish Chinese firms as the dominant global suppliers of solar-grade polysilicon—and it wants its firms to expand their share of semiconductor-grade polysilicon.

Federal freight policy effectively incentivizes the most damaging and least efficient mode of freight transport—trucking—by underpricing access to public infrastructure. A restructured, mode-neutral cost system would encourage more efficient, safer, and environmentally sustainable freight transportation, better serving taxpayers, drivers, and the economy.

France has embarked on an ambitious program to build at least six new large nuclear reactors, applying lessons from recent overruns and delays. While success is far from guaranteed, there are important lessons for the United States as it seeks to jump-start its own nuclear sector through recent ambitious executive orders.

Digital services are the key to unlocking growth for small- and medium-sized enterprises in today’s economy. They help firms overcome financial constraints, close skills gaps, and boost productivity. Policymakers should incentivize SMEs to capitalize on those opportunities.