On May 9, former U.S. Secretary of Commerce Gina Raimondo presented her vision of how to keep America economically competitive, arguing for more public-private sector collaboration, policies to reduce inequality, universal job training and targeted tariffs.
“I wanted everybody, no matter where they were working in the world or what they were working on, to view their job through the lens of enhancing America’s ability to compete and outcompete,” Raimondo said.
The event in the Irving Institute Atrium was part of the Rockefeller Center’s 100 Days Speaker Series and a Portman Lecture in the Spirit of Entrepreneurship. It was moderated by Paul Danos Dean of the Tuck School Matthew Slaughter.
There were about 150 audience members at the talk, which was also sponsored by Dartmouth Dialogues, the Tuck Center for Entrepreneurship and the Center for Business, Government and Society at Tuck.
Raimondo argued that technical innovation is key to keeping America competitive. She added, however, that America can’t be competitive if the fruits of innovation and growth are not equitably shared.
“We aren’t strong if only a very small slice of America can participate in the innovation and in the productivity and wealth that comes from this innovation,” Raimondo said.
This comes as the trade war between China and the United States starts to cools down — with the White House backing down from their harshest tariffs on Monday.
Arjun Sarathy Tu ’25 asked Raimondo about how the United States can maintain its economic competitiveness in light of other countries subsidizing their companies. Raimondo explained that “there is a place for tariffs for countries that don’t play by the rules.”
“I am not a subscriber to 100-some-odd percent tariffs imposed willy nilly without thought or proper execution,” Raimondo said. “But in instances, like you say, American companies aren’t wrong.”
In an interview after the event, Sarathy said this was a “great answer.”
“There’s a targeted case for tariffs as an effective tool, but they are temporary,” Sarathy said. “They are time bound. They have to be measured, specific, relevant, otherwise they have no meaning.”
Raimondo also discussed how wealth inequality is damaging to trust in democratic institutions.
“Unless we figure out how to have more equal opportunity, it’s going to be really rough to maintain our democracy,” Raimondo said. “We have to come up with a set of policies which enables growth. It’s going to be a growth story where everyone can feel they can participate in the growth.”
Raimondo — who was a venture capitalist and served two terms as governor of Rhode Island — said this innovation comes from collaboration between the public and private sectors.
“[I] could go on and on about [how] 40, 50 years ago, how much more private sector, public sector collaboration there was, which laid the foundation for all the innovation that we’re still benefiting from,” Raimondo said.
Raimondo argued for universal job training, cheap and accessible programs preparing individuals to participate in the labor force without formal higher education.
“We need some universal job training which doesn’t bankrupt you or your family and actually leads to a job,” Raimondo said. “The root of that has to be a public-private partnership. That is where I think the private sector has to massively more lean in than they are, and the public sector has to get massively more innovative.”
Attendee Sophia Hall ’26 said she “[felt] really inspired hearing [Raimondo] speak.”
“I thought that my path was in finance and [the] private sector, but now I’m starting to think that there may be more opportunities to explore the intersection of public-private a little bit more carefully,” Hall said. “She had a lot of insights about what someone can do and someone of our skill set can offer in a more public way.”
