Strategy Plan for Mitt Romney
PERSPECTIVE MANAGEMENT PROJECT
MITT ROMNEY – UNEMPLOYMENT
INTRODUCTION
The financial crisis we recently experienced and its economic aftermath in lost output, jobs, and wealth will be studied for decades by economists. Of course, economic policymakers must react more quickly, and in scope and costs the past few years have witnessed unparalleled policy activism. Much of this activity has misunderstood economic trends and how economic policy works. Entrepreneurs and business, and the innovation they produce, have transformed society through economic growth. At the end of the twentieth century, management thinker Peter Drucker looked back and wrote that underneath all the epochal events of that century were important social transformations linked to business. Business not only spurred transformations through innovation, it also created the material basis for social change. It created wealth that allowed society to adjust to the civil rights revolution of the 1960s, as it had during the profound changes of the 1760s and the 1860s. America needs to get its growth groove back. And getting it back is about not just incomes, but jobs as well. To bring the unemployment rate back to its pre-financial-crisis level by the end of the next president’s first term would require real GDP growth averaging 4 percent per year over that period. That is an aggressive goal, but great progress can be made.
But how? A growth agenda for the nation requires several parts: (1) an emphasis on productivity growth, with policies to support saving and investment, innovation and research, trade, education, and training; (2) a budget framework that does not threaten our fiscal health; (3) tax policy that enhances economic growth; (4) regulation that balances growth with concerns about safety and soundness; and (5) a healthy financial system that meets the needs of savers and borrowers.
These policy elements have three themes in common. First,
MITT ROMNEY – UNEMPLOYMENT
INTRODUCTION
The financial crisis we recently experienced and its economic aftermath in lost output, jobs, and wealth will be studied for decades by economists. Of course, economic policymakers must react more quickly, and in scope and costs the past few years have witnessed unparalleled policy activism. Much of this activity has misunderstood economic trends and how economic policy works. Entrepreneurs and business, and the innovation they produce, have transformed society through economic growth. At the end of the twentieth century, management thinker Peter Drucker looked back and wrote that underneath all the epochal events of that century were important social transformations linked to business. Business not only spurred transformations through innovation, it also created the material basis for social change. It created wealth that allowed society to adjust to the civil rights revolution of the 1960s, as it had during the profound changes of the 1760s and the 1860s. America needs to get its growth groove back. And getting it back is about not just incomes, but jobs as well. To bring the unemployment rate back to its pre-financial-crisis level by the end of the next president’s first term would require real GDP growth averaging 4 percent per year over that period. That is an aggressive goal, but great progress can be made.
But how? A growth agenda for the nation requires several parts: (1) an emphasis on productivity growth, with policies to support saving and investment, innovation and research, trade, education, and training; (2) a budget framework that does not threaten our fiscal health; (3) tax policy that enhances economic growth; (4) regulation that balances growth with concerns about safety and soundness; and (5) a healthy financial system that meets the needs of savers and borrowers.
These policy elements have three themes in common. First,