National Competitiveness Quotes

For centuries, economic thinkers, from Adam Smith to John Maynard Keynes, have tried to identify the elusive formula that makes some countries more prosperous and successful than others. My curiosity about this topic spurred me, as a young professor of economics in the late 1970s, to research new ways of measuring national competitiveness.

You know, sometimes I don't understand what's wrong with us. This is just about the most creative and imaginative country on earth—and yet sometimes we just don't seem to have the gumption to exploit our intellectual property. We split the atom, and now we have to get French or Korean scientists to help us build nuclear power stations. We perfected the finest cars on earth—and now Rolls-Royce is in the hands of the Germans. Whatever we invent, from the jet engine to the internet, we find that someone else carts it off and makes a killing from it elsewhere.

I said, yet again, for Germany, Europe is not only indispensable, it is part and parcel of our identity. We've always said German unity, European unity and integration, that's two parts of one and the same coin. But we want, obviously, to boost our competitiveness.

Education has become a condition of national survival.

The costs of an ignorance of science are nor just practical ones like misbegotten policies, forgone cures, and a unilateral disarmament in national competitiveness. There is a moral cost as well. It is an astonishing fact about our species that we understand so much about the history of the universe. the forces that make it tick, the stuff it's made of; the origin of living things, and the machinery of life. A failure to nurture this knowledge shows a philistine indifference to the magnificent achievements humanity is capable of; like allowing a great work of art to molder in a warehouse.

When I grew up, I simply didn't have mentors that said, "Science is important. Science helps you build a country. Science makes a country powerful." And that's such a simple thought, but when you think about what's powered Taiwan and Korea and Silicon Valley and Cambridge.

India has no dearth of brave young men and women and if they get the opportunity and help then we can compete with other nations in space exploration and one of them will fulfil her dreams.

Without any doubt at all, teacher quality is the fundamental differentiator. Not just, incidentally, of education, but I would argue, probably the biggest single differentiator of success for the nations of the 21st Century.

I don't think there is anything this Congress could do more definitively to put people back to work, to stimulate our economy to increase our efficiency, our competitiveness, both nationally and internationally

The need of the hour is to think big. The more we focus on skill, scale & speed, it will increase India's growth trajectory.

Cutting our education budget, that's not a smart choice. That will not help America compete with China.

If we don't re-charge the American Brand, all future challenges - economic, social and political - are destined to be driven to the brink, further jeopardizing the strength and competitiveness of our country and its citizens.

We should be growing and make ourselves, as a state and a nation, more competitive. India, China and these other countries are not waiting for us.

The notion of the competitiveness of countries, on the model of the competitiveness of companies, is nonsense.

Americans don't win. Our country doesn't win. We don't win at trade. We don't win. We can't beat ISIS.

America can't provide health care to people who need it. We can't invest in science and technology, which will determine whether or not we are going to be competitive in the long term. There has never been a country on Earth that saw its economy decline and yet maintained its military superiority.

A state-based regulatory system is quite burdensome. It allows price controls to create market distortions. It can hinder development of national products and can directly impact the competitiveness of U.S. insurers.

So many people want me to run for office because they know I have the right take on what's happening to America in terms of our competition - you know we're not going to be the number one economic force in ten years if we keep going the way we're going.

Russia should be competitive, be able to protect its own interests and influence the processes that are important to it.

As a small country, both in size and population, our future hinges on the quality of our people.

A North Korean soldier would later recall a buddy who had been given an American-made nail clipper and was showing it off to his friends. The soldier clipped a few nails, admired the sharp, clean edges, and marveled at the mechanics of this simple item. Then he realized with a sinking heart: If North Korea couldn’t make such a fine nail clipper, how could it compete with American weapons?