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Symposium

American Views on Economic Leadership

Event date



From Robert B Menschel Economics Symposium.

In April 2024, CFR launched RealEcon: Reimagining American Economic Leadership Initiative with the goal of rebuilding a durable consensus on the U.S. role in the international economy. As a first step, the RealEcon team toured the country to ask Americans their views on trade, investment, foreign aid, China, and other economic issues. They visited nine states and spoke with over 400 people, including local elected officials, business leaders, farmers, workers, students, and journalists. This event will feature a fireside chat with former New Hampshire Governor Chris Sununu and a panel discussion with senior experts and interlocutors of key themes and policy takeaways from the tour.

The Robert B. Menschel Economics Symposium was established in 2014 and was made possible through a generous endowment gift from Robert B. Menschel while a senior director at Goldman Sachs. Since Menschel’s death in 2022, the symposium continues in his honor and memory.

In-Person Keynote Session: A Conversation With Chris Sununu

Speaker

Presider

Introductory Remarks

Transcript

GOODMAN: OK. Well, good morning. Good morning. Good morning from Washington. Welcome to the Council on Foreign Relations. And welcome to the hundreds of people watching online; delighted you can join us as well.

Let me begin by thanking Robert B. Menschel for the generous gift he made to the CFR that made this event and similar events possible.

Thanks also to the Amy Falls and Hartley Rogers Foundation for their generous support of the RealEcon Initiative, which I run and which I’ll explain in just a second.

So my name is Matthew Goodman. And I direct an initiative here at CFR called RealEcon, which is sort of an acronym for Reimagining American Economic Leadership, which is an initiative we launched almost exactly a year ago with the goal of exploring America’s role in the international economy, why that matters to U.S. interests, why it matters to the American people, why it matters to the rest of the world, and to try to nudge us towards greater understanding/greater agreement on what a constructive role for the U.S. in the global economy ought to be that would serve all of those people and those interests.

And you know, we...

In-Person Plenary Session: American Views on Economic Leadership

Speakers

  • Donald Evans
    Chief Executive Officer and President, Pittsburgh Gateways Corporations, Energy Innovation Center
  • Catherine A. Novelli
    President, Listening for America; Former Undersecretary for Economic Growth, Energy, and the Environment, U.S. Department of State (2014–17)

Presider

  • Greg Ip
    Chief Economics Commentator, Wall Street Journal

Transcript

IP: Thank you very much for coming for this part of the session. Continuing with our discussion of U.S. economic leadership, this panel is going to talk a little bit about how folks out there in the economy—the workers, the communities themselves—are affected by and how they actually regard the importance and the quality of American economic leadership at home and abroad. And are—the priorities of the folks that we interact with here in Washington, are they the same priorities of folks on the ground out there making decisions for themselves, for their families, and when they go to the ballot box?

And we have a terrific set of guests here to help us answer this question. Starting from my—I won’t go—there’s details in your packet there about who our guests are.

But starting right here on my right, Don Evans. He’s been through many private and public sector roles, but right now he is CEO and president of the Pittsburgh Gateways Corporation and the Energy Innovation Center. Right, Don?

Karla Morales, vice president, Arizona Technology Council, and is also, I believe, on the board of a community college, right—Pima Community College?

MORALES: That’s correct.

IP: And, Catherine Novelli, you...