The essence of the message is that three billion people are now playing in the world economic game that weren't there a dozen years ago. For the first time in human history, largely as a result of the convergence of technological developments in the last half-dozen years, competition -- for jobs, incomes, and ultimately, for standards of living -- is truly global.
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It is impossible to overstate the implications of this for the people of the United States and for the people of Maine. If you think the world is still round, just call the customer support center for your favorite piece of consumer electronics.
I had a problem a while back with my Direct TV, so I called 1-800-Direct-TV, and got a very nice guy on the line. I gave him my phone number. He said, "Angus, what's the problem? Can I help you?" "Yes," I said, and went into the details. He said, "Well, you do this, you do that, and get on the screen, and click on this, and so on." We became fast friends. His name was Jim. By the end of the conversation, he said, "Angus, is there anything else I can do for you?" I said, "Yes, Jim, tell me where you are." He said, "New Delhi." I wouldn't have known he was from India unless I'd asked. In his book, Friedman talks about classes in India where they are teaching Indian nationals to speak English with a Midwestern accent or a Southern accent or, heaven help us, a New York accent. In my hometown of Brunswick, I was talking about this, and a friend of mine who works for Mid Coast Hospital came up afterwards. He said, "Did you know that if you break your arm in Brunswick, Maine, and go into the emergency room at night and have an x-ray, the x-ray is read by a radiologist in Australia?" He explained that there are not enough radiologists in a rural area to be on call 24 hours a day and it's cheaper to just send it over the Internet for a radiologist in Australia to read. I've concluded that there is no job safe from being sent somewhere else in the world except those jobs where the person actually touches you or something that you own -- which basically leaves us with chiropractors and plumbers. That's about it. Anything else can be outsourced.
The fact that the game has changed is not all bad news. For example, this revolution of digitized information has made it so that small towns, whether they're in Maine or New Brunswick, Vermont or New Hampshire, are no longer disadvantaged relative to those with better access to urban centers.
As Friedman says, "Your desk goes with you wherever you are. All of a sudden, my business has phenomenal distribution. I don't care whether you're in Bangalore or Bangor." (I love it that he used Bangor.) "I can get to you and you can get to me." Now, suddenly, we can compete with people all over the world. That's the good news.
The bad news is people all over the world can compete with us. And a lot of them, particularly at lower-skilled jobs, are willing to work at a lot lower price. We are not going to compete with the world on labor rates. So we must compete in the brains department; in the end, innovation is our only remaining advantage. But to maintain that advantage, we have a lot of work to do.
What's happening now with businesses leaving the U.S. is just the tip of the iceberg. Ladies and gentlemen, we are in the middle of a world historic change that will define this age. There is a freight train headed in our direction and we're right in the middle of the tracks. The problem is we're blinded by our past success. Through a combination of luck, circumstance, and the enormous capacity of our people to be creative and productive, America enjoyed an incredible economic ride over the past 60 years. But those circumstances have unalterably changed. And -- in a powerful image much used by Friedman -- we're suddenly on a level playing field, with the disadvantage of having grown fat and complacent during our period of economic hegemony.
This is big, unprecedented stuff. What exactly will Maine people (or any Americans, for that matter -- this is not just a Maine challenge) do for a living 20 years from now when the call centers could be in India and Singapore, semiconductors in China, paper in Latin America (where it takes 15 years for a tree to mature vs. 35 years here), and financial services in Ireland? We won't need a governor; we'll need a chief park ranger. What will we be doing? I honestly don't know the answer to this question, nor have I found anyone who does. But I do know something about this future: Whatever jobs that will exist will depend not upon our access to natural resources or cheap labor, proximity to markets or low taxes, energy prices or what nice people we are. Rather, the jobs of that not-so-far-off time will be based upon more and better education, involve technology in one way or another, and will have been generated by a new wave of collaborative innovation (which, in itself, will have sprung from the confluence of education and technology).
Part of the solution is pretty clear-cut. How long can Maine expect to keep up while having the shortest school year on the planet, for example (yes, 20% shorter than New Hampshire, not to mention China and India)? But fixing these structural problems is easy compared to the deeper and more important job of conveying to our kids the sense of urgency that their counterparts in other parts of the world take to school with them every day.
One stab at confronting this daunting challenge -- among many others, like strengthened community colleges, support for research and development in our university and private sector, tax and governmental reform -- is the Maine Learning Technology Initiative (better known as the laptop project). This idea was, and is, aimed directly at giving our children a fighting chance on the new playing field.
When first proposed, we knew it was a big idea; as it was implemented, we realized that it was a radical idea. Now, it is becoming more and more clear that it is a necessary idea.
The basic premise of the project remains the same -- if Maine people can become the best educated and the most digitally literate people on earth, we stand a chance in the coming global contest. If we don't make this leap (and it has to be a leap -- we don't have time for gradual evolution), and instead stay in the land of short school years and once-a-week computer labs, we're sunk, pure and simple.
The critical component to the Maine Learning Technology Initiative vision is one-to-one access to a digital device. Today, that device is a conventional laptop; five years from now, it may well be something more akin to a PDA. But whatever the device looks like, the underlying purposes are the same: instant access to information, and the means to process, manipulate, and share that information -- all in a package that's portable, easy to use, and will fit in a backpack.
The laptop project has put Maine on the educational map across the country and around the world. We've hosted observers from Australia, Scotland, Ireland, France, and Canada. Maine educators have been invited to share the details of the project in Massachusetts, Texas, New Hampshire, Michigan, North Carolina, Georgia, Pennsylvania, and Maryland. And everywhere, this concept has come to be known as the "Maine Plan." They're watching -- and imitating -- us because we're onto something.
Any vision of the future of Maine education has to include some version of this groundbreaking project. It should remain a statewide and state-supported initiative so that its benefits flow to all the kids in Maine, not just those lucky enough to live in districts or towns with the local resources and vision to carry it forward on their own. Further, we should move as soon as possible to push the project into the high schools, taking care to spend enough time and money to ensure that our dedicated and able high school teachers have the training and support necessary to make it work. In the words of Tom Friedman,"This is not a test" -- the unprecedented challenge of globalization is all too real. The children of those who recognize this challenge and respond in creative ways will face a struggle, but at least have a fighting chance. The children of those who ignore it or try to apply old solutions to this very new problem will be stuck in a world of diminishing options and declining expectations. It's up to our generation to save the next; they will judge us not by how well we succeeded but whether we tried at all.
"Each morning on the plains of Africa, a gazelle awakens." The sun is up; the lion is hungry. It's time to run.
Angus S. King Jr. was governor of Maine from 1995 to 2003.
