We need to educate more engineers, technical people and business people. That's my 2 cents.
Otherwise we cede the future to someone who will.
Silicon Valley has a lot of qualified people; go outside and it's another story. Why? Because we make them.
Of course Sillicon Valley has a lot of educated people. The type of industry in Silicon Valley determines education levels. However, there are numerous regions in the US that have qualified and actually rank better in education than that region.
Also, yes, companies around Silicon Valley do support the education of their employees, but so does pretty much any serious organization in the country, whether it is a private company, public company, or governmental agency. I meet weekly with people who actually decide how much they will reimburse their workers for education, what my department has to offer to cover gaps, etc.
However, again, we chose to go this way, and the Chinese decided to go the other way. Chinese have basically an excess number of engineers, whereas Silicon Valley, regardless of all success, etc., does not! Don't forget, we are talking about engineers that are necessary to run everyday assemblies, etc. (what Tim Cook recently talked about). Silicon Valley does not have nearly enough of those engineers, and Ann Arbor in Michigan would probably be a much better place to get an education in that type of engineering. That is because even though organizations pay for education or part of it, people are generally very strategic not to waste that opportunity and are careful in what degrees they get. I am not sure whether anything is assembled in Silicon Valley, so why would San Jose State offer that type of education?
That is the problem. For companies to open factories in the US, they must develop also robust partnerships with local universities not only when it comes to general support and research (that is given) but to roll out enough skilled workforce for that type of industry. That takes time! For example, our engineering department is very strong in computer science, aerospace etc. bcs. huge military presence. But let's say Apple decides to assemble MacBook in Colorado Springs. Our university would need at least a year (and that is super fast timeline, pretty much impossible) just to hire necessary people to offer classes. In China, you have basically suficit of engineers (which in US would depress salaries etc) and can offer to Apple immediate workforce. In China, people can enter universities for free and roll out engineers like on the conveyor belt. That has a lot of negative implications, too, and there is the issue of access in systems that are "free," as not everyone can actually enroll, but there is no financial pressure on those who choose to pursue that career, and they are more likely to risk going in that field. Here in the US, unless jobs are available, no one is going to spend $43,000 a year at Berkley (before financial aid) unless they can get a job. China, on the other hand, has at its disposal enough engineers to make Apple choose China as a point of assembly, not because it is cheap but because of the availability of a skilled workforce.
Both systems have advantages. The best universities are located in the US. Yes, there are some Chinese universities in the top 10, and some British, such as Oxford, Cambridge or Eton, but overall, the US universities produce the highest number of patents. So far, the US system is proving better, but ballooning student debt might create huge problems.
