In last night’s State of the Union address, President Obama urged Congress to put America’s future first by making the investments in innovation, education, and infrastructure that will allow America to “do big things” and maintain our place as the world’s leading economy.
We agree. The nation faces a decision whether to invest and grow or to simply grow stagnate. As the President said, “[r] evolutions in technology have transformed the way we live, work and do business.” We must take the steps necessary to evolve, compete, and win in this changing world – research, education, and infrastructure are the right place to start.
President Obama advocated federal investments in research and education, and making a down payment on America’s future economic growth by re-building infrastructure – including expanding high-speed wireless Internet to 98 percent of all Americans within the next five years.
CCIA agrees. In order for America to continue to be the world’s dominant economy, for America’s businesses (like Facebook and Google, as Obama mentioned) to continue to create the world’s must-have products and services, and for America’s workers to continue to be the most productive in the world, we must do these things – and those investments are very big things indeed.
Particularly, CCIA supports: extending and strengthening incentives for research and innovation and federal investment in basic research; investing in education so America for a better, more productive workforce; extending visas to the best and brightest who have come to America to study and earn advanced science and technology degrees; ensuring the Internet remains an engine for growth, innovation, and opportunity by expanding high-speed Internet to all Americans and keeping the Internet free from threats to its openness, both by governments and private actors; and using trade as a tool for economic growth by opening new markets to American products and services, as well as enforcing trade agreements to stop discrimination against e-commerce.