Policy Matters - PMUSA
Essential expertise in public policy, economics, and financial markets
IMMIGRATION
Immigration policy; securing America's borders, controlling the number of foreign nationals who enter the country, and ensuring assimilation into American society is the most important issue confronting U.S. policy makers. The nation state is the best organizing principle for the global population. Nation states have been long defined by secure borders, a common language, a shared culture, and a nation of citizens dedicated to the common good. U.S. immigration policy as administered by successive Presidents and Congresses from 1965 to 2025 ignored those tenets and threw open U.S. borders to all who wish to enter, legally or illegally, and discouraged assimilation. American citizens, American tax payers, have paid a high price. Read more...
FISCAL POLICY
Trillion dollar yearly budget deficits, trillion dollar annual interest payments on the national debt, and nearly $40 trillion in total national debt outstanding should be a warning to us all. Fiscal policy is out of control. Led by both political parties, trillion dollar annual deficits are the norm, and more and more debt seemingly doesn't matter. It does and it will. America is on a unsustainable fiscal path at the federal, state, and local level. Read more...
INTERNATIONAL TRADE
The U.S. trade deficit in goods set another yearly record in 2025 reaching $1.23 trillion. 2025 was the fifth year in a row the U.S. trade deficit in goods exceeded $1 trillion. America is reliant on a strategic foe for many of the goods needed each day from military equipment to pharmaceuticals and the base ingredients to the metals needed for renewable power to basic consumer goods. The transfer of wealth from America to foreign countries and the subsequent loss of ownership of trillions of dollars of U.S. assets should be a serious national security concern. The loss of jobs, skills, expertise, and infrastructure has weakened America. For nearly 50 years America has practiced a unilateral free trade policy that has wrecked havoc on the domestic economy. Read more...
REGULATION
Excessive regulation is strangling the U.S. economy. For decades American businesses and entrepreneurs have been slowed by an ever growing list of laws, rules, and regulations at the federal, state and local level. According to the Office of the Federal Register, at the federal level alone there are 430 government departments and agencies imposing rules and regulations upon households and businesses. To enhance productivity and efficiency across the economy the regulatory burden must be reduced to free up capital and labor. Read more...
EDUCATION
The connection between high quality education and economic prosperity of a society has been well established. Average income and education attainment levels have been positively correlated over time. The skill level of a labor force and the price of attaining those skills are key elements to a nation's standard of living and international competitiveness. How to teach, what to teach, the language to teach in, the quality of education, who goes to school and who doesn't, and who pays have been decisions challenging American educators and policy makers for decades. For more than 30 years there has been recognition by employers, parents, and policy makers America's public education system is failing. Four years on from the COVID lock downs, that process has been accelerated. Read more...