Friday, February 5, 2010

Two Suggestions for Gov. Deval Patrick, Dem. MA

1) forget the stem cell stuff and go electronic.
Some day, in the distant future, after expenditures of hundreds of millions of dollars, stem cells may help someone, and the stem cell industry MAY employ a small number of people, and the stem cell industry MAY have revenue that results in tax dollars for the state.

But it is a risky bet; stem cells may in fact just sputter along in the non profit research lab (no tax revenue for the state at the university) for the next 10 or 20 years, employing a relatively small number of people. Just look at gene therapy, or antisense RNA, the wonder technologys of the 1980s (!) and 1990s, both still struggling to find a real role in the world.
Rather then put state money on the stem cell bandwagon, MA should be the home of the electronic body part: go electronic !! For example, implantable insulin pumps are already here; a little improvment, well within our technological grasp, you won't need stem cells for diabetics.
Ditto for electronic hearts, or electronic eyes; those products WILL be here - it is not a speculative gamble like stem cells, but a near certaintly, and the state that has the electronic body part industry will have thousands of good paying jobs, whith lots of tax revenue, long before stem cells get out of the RnD lab.
Not only will electronics results in real products faster, which will result in real jobs and real tax revenues, but we will have less competition; while our natural biotech competitors, like CA, are competing with each other, chasing the stem cell will o' the wisp, we will have less competition for electronic body parts.

2) Go linux. Every day, the state and local Gov'ts, and public shools of MA spend huge amounts of money on software - money that goes largely out of state; all the Windows and Office programs are MA tax dollars going to Redmond , WA.
The govenor should announce that all state computers will run only LINUX and "open source" programs.
And what will happen if we do this ?
First, we will save lots of money that is now going almost all to out of state compnaies, and enriching CA and WA; great places, but it is not the job of the goverment of MA to enrich other states.
Second, we will take all that money and promptly spend it on consultants to help confused state employees with the new software. But at least these consultants will be MA tax payers.

But the real payoff comes when other states and towns and school system see that we have a better way to do software, and that we are saving lots of money. From all over the world, schools and cities and states will come to MA and hire all those consultants (who got trained on state tax dollars) to setup LINUX open soure software.
MA will become the world center of the software industry; thousands of good paying, non polluting jobs.

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