What would you say to Washington (that you could say in polite company) if you had the chance? 100 PBLN leaders are heading to Capitol Hill to meet with leaders in Congress and the Obama Administration about the state of the American economy and to discuss how to plan for inventing the next one. Of course “next one” doesn’t just mean roll it back and play it again. Below is our vision statement for this visit, and some of the issues and themes we will be talking about and working on together:
PBLN 4th Annual CEO Summit
“Inventing America’s Next Economy”
Washington is in gridlock as policymakers face serious long-term problems: chronic unemployment, a structural budget deficit, crippling health care costs, a public education system that is failing our children and failing to cultivate the workforce of the future, flat and declining household incomes, and fossil fuel and foreign energy dependence.
Neither government nor business can solve these problems alone. PBLN members share a common perspective that the country needs to align productivity and principles, and that doing so will require a different kind of focus on our products and practices and on public policy.
We view the following to be among the elements necessary to the invention of America’s next economy: eliminating our long-term structural deficit; eliminating unintended barriers to entrepreneurship and innovation in the private sector; investing in public education; allowing market forces to reveal the true price of carbon emitting forms of energy; reshaping our healthcare system around prevention of disease and healthier outcomes for patients; ensuring that safe and affordable homes are available to residents with low and moderate incomes; admitting new immigrants based on criteria that match both our values and our needs as a society.
- We view fiscal discipline as essential and implore government to focus on the long-term structural deficit and not just tactical budget and program cuts that fail to approach any meaningful long-term impact.
- We applaud Obama Administration initiatives such as Executive Order 13563 “Improving Regulation and Regulatory Review,” the Start Up America Partnership, and “America’s Next Top Energy Innovator” – all efforts to remove unintended barriers to entrepreneurship.
- We believe a comprehensive progressive energy policy is vital to national security, public health, the economy, and the environment. We support renewable and clean energy portfolio standards, pricing carbon, and maintaining the EPA’s power to regulate greenhouse gas emissions.
- We support aggressive implementation of the Race to the Top education innovation model, deeper development of turn-around strategies for schools that are failing our children, and a focus on public higher education as a pathway to the 21st century workforce and global economy.
- We support robust implementation of the Affordable Care Act to ensure universal access to the highest quality preventive and therapeutic care our scientists, healthcare professionals and families can provide.
- We support housing policies, such as the Low Income Housing Tax Credit and Section 8 that employ market- driven models to make safe, affordable homes available to low and moderate-income residents.
- We support immigration reform that allows the U.S. to remain the world’s destination of choice for the innovators, entrepreneurs and workforce we need to sustain our economy. We support immediate passage of the Start Up Visa Act of 2011 while acknowledging it is only one part of a much larger reform agenda.
- We support the Corporation for National and Community Service initiatives as a proven strategy for (1) engaging the American people in the work of our core values as a nation; (2) delivering essential services and (3) contributing to the training and development of a 21st Century workforce.
A Special Thanks to PBLN’s 2011 Gold Sponsors
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