We cant ignore international competition. The question for the committee is, if the United States isnt going to adopt some form of intellectual property bonds or patent box, what are we going to do . Are we going to just ignore what is going on in the rest of the world . It hardly seems like a good idea. But the downside and people have noticed this of the patent box or intellectual property boxes that unless theyre carefully crafted, you can have a serious problem of encouraging too much property being included in the patent box, and you get a lot of revenue erosion that way, and its pretty undesirable. The issue really is what are we trying to achieve with the intellectual property box and patent something to the answer should be we want to encourage activities we would otherwise lose, and if we find ourselves in that situation, then we should try to figure out a way to craft one of these things. The rest of the world is doing and it we ignore them at our peril. I think i have a diff
People working to get themselves out of poverty. Sam from the financial times. Thanks very much. You were talking earlier about the u. S. As a bright spot, among advanced economies. The story of the president ial campaign has not been that American Voters feel this has been a bright spot recovery. Is there a risk the administration is feeling out of touch with public mood about the u. S. Economy at the moment or are we overestimating just how negative people feel about the economy . First of all, i dont know, you know i look at evidence from the measures that economists look at about how people feel about the economy are the Consumer Sentiment index and the Consumer Confidence index from the Conference Board and the university of michigan. When you look at measures like that, you see that confidence has been consistently rising since the recession. And last year reached levels we hadnt seen in over a decade. So i see a number of ways in which people are positive both about their situat