GE CEO Jeffrey Immelt, the newly appointed chairman of President Obama’s Council on Jobs and Competitiveness, outlined his vision for making the U.S. more competitive in the global marketplace in a March 8 speech to The Executive Club of Chicago, contributing writer John Kerastas reported.
It was good to hear that at the onset, Mr. Immelt asserted, “We’ve got to have an economy that’s balanced. It is not our destiny to be just a service economy. We have to have both a service industry and a strong manufacturing industry. It is not natural for a powerful and successful economy to have a trillion dollar trade deficit. We’ve got to export more; we’ve got to innovate more; we’ve got to manufacture more.”
Regarding his role on the Council on Jobs and Competitiveness, he noted that the council has just started. “But I can give you a few of the big themes that I think are going to be important in a more competitive America:
“We need some real solutions for energy security and affordable healthcare. These are two pillars of infrastructure that can ensure long-term competitiveness. We need to open more energy supply, accelerate our investment in renewable, drive technology like nuclear power, and leverage our advantage in natural gas.”
