The things that I recommended Canada begin, and much more, the U.S. began doing 40 years ago. The old expression is “The best time to plant a tree is 20 years ago. The second best time is now.” We simply have no strategy, no orientation and no capacity to generate and control intangible stock assets. They work on a principle of negative rights or restrictions, which is the polar opposite to the traditional tangible economy. We just had no capacity and no orientation.
There's a direct causal relationship. Canada is in last place in productivity growth in the last 46 years in the OECD, forecasted for the next 30 years. There is a direct causal relationship to this inattention to generating, controlling and then commercializing intangible stock assets. I've done business in 156 countries and it is in the water table of every aspect of how they manage research, commercialization, education and so forth in the successful innovation economies. It is epicentral.
I chaired a panel on this for Ontario. There are three simple recommendations. They're fairly similar to the recommendations here.
We simply didn't change for a changed world.