Practice Management

Andy Grove on U.S. jobs: "Rebuild our industrial commons"

By Dan Hull

At Bloomberg see Grove's "How to Make an American Job Before It's Too Late". Excerpts:

The scaling process is no longer happening in the U.S. And as long as that?s the case, plowing capital into young companies that build their factories elsewhere will continue to yield a bad return in terms of American jobs.

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We should develop a system of financial incentives: Levy an extra tax on the product of offshored labor. (If the result is a trade war, treat it like other wars -- fight to win.) Keep that money separate. Deposit it in the coffers of what we might call the Scaling Bank of the U.S. and make these sums available to companies that will scale their American operations.

Such a system would be a daily reminder that while pursuing our company goals, all of us in business have a responsibility to maintain the industrial base on which we depend and the society whose adaptability -- and stability -- we may have taken for granted.

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If what I?m suggesting sounds protectionist, so be it.

Full post as published by What About Clients? on July 05, 2010 (boomark / email).