CEO Summit focuses on supply side support

The Times is sponsoring a ‘CEO Summit’ this week, with about a hundred Chief Executives including Sire Terry Leahy of Tesco, Sire John Rose of Rolls Royce and Steven Hester of RBS. It provided their main headlines yesterday and several pages of coverage, which contain a great deal of comment about the opinions of the delegates about the Coalition Government’s plans to cut the deficit. The summit has been attended by George Osborne, David Cameron and Vince Cable as well, providing plenty of opportunity for analysis of fiscal policy and the discussions at the G20 over the weekend.

The main theme of the reports focuses on supply side measures such as reform of corporate taxes to ‘lure multinationals back to Britain’ and a plan to revive government trade delegations to lead business visits to high-growth countries such as China and India. There is an article about Jean Chretien, former Canadian Prime Minister who presided over the Canadian policies which led to recovery from a fiscal deficit and, in the Business section, an analysis of five key policy aims on the business leaders’ wish list.

It is a useful resource for examining the possible impact of supply-side policies, and while you can no longer access it from Times Online unless you give in a pay their high subscription rates (which don’t so far seem to offer the option of an institutional subscription for schools), it would be worth getting hold of a copy and using it to evaluate the role of government in promoting the supply side of the economy.