Washington, DC shows every evidence of still being haunted by the past economy, huddling under the sheets to hide from the economy future.
Everyone recognizes that the main driver of our economy is the technology industry, yet politicians continue to play to the industries that are the hallmarks of yesterday’s economy, in some cases outright disadvantaging our future economy.
Consider just two of the many available examples – Government understanding of technology, and a rusty old tax code that all but invites future economy to leave the US.
The Office of Technology Administration (OTA--an office within the Department of Commerce) was created to promote technological growth and innovation in the economy through market analysis, to help formulate policy to promote global technological competitiveness, and to establish technology standards where needed. While neither Congress nor the Bush administration has shown any enthusiasm for cutting useless pork out of the budget, these important (if not critical) efforts has been cut for years by Congress, and this year the Bush administration plans to defund it altogether.
Meanwhile, institutions of the old economy such as the Department of Transportation and the Department of Agriculture continue to thrive under the beneficience of Congress.
In the last few moments of this Congress the collective body barely mustered the will to pass yet another extension of the R&D tax credit – for a year. Congress has continually declined, for 25 years, to make this change permanent. Preferring to play politics, and failing to rewrite a tax code that is no longer appropriate for our current or future economy, they spool out tax credits for just long enough to keep companies dependent on their largesse but not long enough for companies to make long-term investment and research plans.
Perhaps our political Scrooges will yet awake from their fog, clear, bright and jovial and say to the future economy, “Thank you, I am much obliged to you. I thank you fifty times. Bless you!”