I agree that the dynamic here needs to be driven by industry in the sense of recognizing or identifying where the problems are and what the capacity is that needs to be filled. How do you encourage the private sector to do that? So much of what I'm reading is that industry is recognizing that they have to do this, and notwithstanding the risk of training somebody and losing them, if they don't invest in this way they are not going to attract the people they need and they're not going to keep the people they have spent all that money on. I often think of the comparison to retail. You spend all this money trying to attract new customers. Why don't you spend more money keeping the customers you already have happy? It's a safer investment in a way.
I think it's a combination of things. I think it's leadership from opinion leaders, key decision-makers, obviously governments. I think it is also leadership coming from the corporate sector, and I think there has been leadership. There have been a number of symposiums where companies from Microsoft right through to Toyota are talking about the need to do this. To incentivize business there may need to be a combination of tax incentives or tax credits that enhance or encourage companies to actually spend money on their employees. Arguably, we need the same thing for employees who want to invest in their own education and have a form of registered retirement savings plan for people so that they can invest in their own education.
I also think that unless we invest in the infrastructure of the institutions that are capable of providing good quality education of the sort we're talking about, we won't have the full dynamic. So I think we really do need a comprehensive approach of let's look at our dollars and where they're being spent, at where can they be better spent in order to address this, at how do we encourage the private sector, and where do we get the leadership to be able to put this issue on the radar screen for the country if it's not there already. In some circles it is, but in many circles it isn't.
Talking about competitiveness is not all that interesting, arguably, but when you start talking to people about prosperity and what do you want for your children's future, then I think people do tend to pay attention, especially if we're also talking about going after people who are underemployed and don't have the opportunities to move themselves forward because pursuing education is expensive, because they'd have to leave work, and they really can't afford to do it.