The Chamber’s 2010 Public Policy Agenda is guided by four primary goals—reducing business costs, improving the talent pipeline, promoting innovation, and strengthening infrastructure & development. The goals are outlined below, together with the issues and initiatives that are key to achieving each of them:
1) Reducing Business Costs
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Health Care Costs – Curbing health care inflation via payment reform, electronic medical records, and administrative simplification measures.
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Corporate Taxation – Seeking a more competitive state corporate tax code that eliminates the adverse impacts of combined reporting and promotes hiring, expansion, and investment in the region.
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Energy Reform – Ensuring pro-competitive implementation of laws promoting energy alternatives and regulating greenhouse emissions, while working to promote energy efficiency and increase the regional energy supply.
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Unemployment Insurance – Targeting inequities and lowering costs via systemic reforms.
2) Improving the Talent Pipeline
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Talent Development & Retention – Expanding the skilled worker pipeline via talent retention efforts, leadership cultivation, and strengthened business-academia relations.
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Internship Initiative – Partnering with the Boston Federal Reserve on new models connecting students with potential employers in the Greater Boston region.
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Minority Professional Development – Expanding opportunities for minority-owned businesses in the region, including our continued partnership with the Initiative for a New Economy.
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K-12 Education – Advancing new school models, such as Charter and Readiness schools, as well as the implementation of new turnaround strategies for underperforming schools.
3) Promoting Innovation
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Life Sciences – Furthering development of the critical life sciences cluster through permitting and regulatory improvement, as well as expanded tax incentives.
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Financial Services – Strengthening one of the region’s largest industries via sound regulatory and corporate tax reforms, and skilled worker training.
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Federal Research Funding – Driving federal research funding growth with a national, Chamber-led coalition.
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STEM Education – Focusing on new initiatives to increase the supply of science and math teachers, and the number of college graduates with degrees in science, math or engineering.
4) Strengthening Infrastructure & Development
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Transportation Reform – Securing the implementation of structural and systemic transportation reforms enacted in 2009, while preserving and expanding state infrastructure funding sources.
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Development – Working to lower regulatory barriers to new development in the region’s leading industries, and streamline reviews at city and state levels while preserving government oversight.
Through enhanced collaboration with business groups, expanded legislative outreach, and a focus on job creation, the Chamber will continue to work to improve the economic future of all who live and work in the Greater Boston region.
For more information on the Chamber’s policy agenda, contact Tim
Sweeney, director of public policy, at 617-557-7325, or Sarah Lanning, assistant director of economic development, at 617-557-7345.
