Project Socrates

Project Socrates was a classified U.S. Defense Intelligence Agency program established in 1983 within the Reagan administration. It was founded and directed by physicist Michael C. Sekora to determine why the United States was unable to maintain economic competitiveness—and to rectify the situation.[1][2]

According to Project Socrates:

[B]ird’s eye view of competition went far beyond, in terms of scope and completeness, the extremely narrow slices of data that were available to the professors, professional economists, and consultants that addressed the issue of competitiveness. The conclusions that the Socrates team derived about competitiveness in general and about the U.S. in particular were in almost all cases in direct opposition to what the professors, economists and consultants had been saying for years, and to what had been accepted as irrefutable underlying truths by decision-makers throughout the U.S.[1]

When Reagan's presidential term ended and the Bush administration came to the White House, Project Socrates was labeled as "industrial policy", and began to fall from favor. As a result, in April 1990, the program was defunded.[3][4]

  1. ^ a b Sanders, Joshua (September 14, 2010). "Spurring America's Economic Renaissance". Economy in Crisis. Archived from the original on 26 January 2011. Retrieved 31 January 2011.
  2. ^ Yates, Ronald E. (1992-07-05). "For Some Executives, 'Trade Wars' Taking On A Literal Meaning". Chicago Tribune. Retrieved 2010-05-30.
  3. ^ Wicker, Tom (May 24, 1990). "IN THE NATION; The High-Tech Future". The New York Times. Retrieved 31 January 2011.
  4. ^ Markoff, John (May 20, 1990). "Technology Official Quits at Pentagon". The New York Times. Retrieved 2013-10-15.