The Globe and Mail today published (subscription required) a must-read OpED written by Jim Balsillie (cofounder of Council of Canadian Innovators | Conseil canadien des innovateurs). This should serve as the basis for any public policy on how to solve Canada’s productivity crisis. There are far too many nuggets of gold to list but here are key quotes.
“We live in a knowledge economy, where value is derived from intangible assets. This economy is epitomized by the global race for intellectual-property (IP) ownership and control of data, transforming global markets into a new landscape, where ideas are owned, data are the new natural resource and algorithms are the new machinery and equipment. Canadian discourse on productivity and our policy making need to reflect that reality. Instead, discourse on the productivity crisis remains stuck in the 1970s, awash with diagnoses and solutions that have no bearing on what moves the productivity dial in the 21st-century economy. If we have any chance of fixing Canada’s productivity challenge, first we must fix how we talk about it.”
“Companies that own valuable IP and have requisite data assets scale more easily, pursue or create new markets more quickly and have the capacity to block new entrants completely, including by acquiring early-stage companies on the cheap. Canada’s businesses own dismal amounts of IP, control dismal stocks of data assets and therefore lack the opportunity to invest gainfully.”
“But in the contemporary global economy, simply investing in new equipment and machinery is not a source of productivity gains because the same machinery, equipment and capital are also available to low-cost countries. For Canada, deploying this strategy, let alone with government subsidies, is a race to the economic bottom.”
”Lack of competitive intensity” is not the reality for Canada’s entrepreneurs. They already compete globally and face intense competition, not just from direct competitors but also because of strategic behaviour from smart countries that work hand-in-glove with their industries to advance their economic interests.”
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