Center for American Entrepreneurship

CAE’s policy agenda to revitalize American entrepreneurship

Innovation

Commercializing new ideas is the basic craft and contribution of entrepreneurs. Innovation can come from entrepreneurs’ imagination, through experimentation, or as the result of scientific inquiry and discovery.

Whether developing a new product, or developing, marketing, distributing, or delivering existing products in a new way, commercializing new ideas are the essence of innovation, which drives productivity gains and economic growth, and creates jobs, wealth, and opportunity.

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Talent

World-class talent is essential to turn great new ideas into viable products and services, identify and cultivate new markets, and build great businesses.

Entrepreneurs create new jobs but are often unable to find candidates with the required skills. The U.S. education system is failing to meet the skill needs of 21st-century businesses, and America’s immigration policies fail to recognize that the competition for innovative talent is global.

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Capital

Capital is the lifeblood of any new business.

Entrepreneurs need capital to further develop their product or service idea, research the marketplace, hire employees, and develop and implement a strategy for identifying and targeting customers.

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Regulation

Regulation is essential to healthy market economies, but it isn’t free or without consequence.

The stifling effect of regulatory burden, complexity, and uncertainty is particularly challenging for fragile startups, which lack the resources and scale of larger firms over which to absorb and amortize the costs of compliance.

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Taxes

The U.S. tax code presents a number of obstacles for startups – obstacles that can be the difference between survival and failure.

The current tax code penalizes businesses with early-stage losses, discourages investors from backing new ventures, and impedes the growth of promising young companies.

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America the Entrepreneurial

Mark America’s 250th anniversary in 2026 by joining entrepreneurs and neighbors across the nation celebrating “America the Entrepreneurial,” which will mobilize more than 250,000 Americans in activities and coalitions spanning all 50 states.

Center for American Entrepreneurship Releases New Report on State of Small Business in Pennsylvania

One out of every 100 workers in the United States is employed by a small business in Pennsylvania and these businesses generate more than $56 billion in worker wages annually. These and other findings in The State of Small Businesses in Pennsylvania, a new report issued by the Center for American Entrepreneurship (CAE), highlight the national importance of Pennsylvania small businesses, and identify steps state and local policymakers should consider to support small businesses.

2024 Year-in-Review

2024 was a very busy year for CAE on all fronts — policy and advocacy, publications and media, and events and roundtables. Our 2024 Year-in-Review provides a great summary of our top activities and achievements on each front, with hotlinks to relevant letters, Op/Eds, and other documents.

CAE Joins Other Members of Innovator Alliance in Letter to Trump Transition Team Regarding Tax Policy

CAE Joins Six Colleague Organizations to Launch the Innovator Alliance to Advocate for Pro-Innovation Tax Policy

America's AI Policy Must Include Startups

The speed with which policymakers have focused on the opportunities and challenges of AI has been impressive. But, unfortunately, that focus has to date omitted something critical – the implications of AI for, and the insights of, America’s new and small businesses. That needs to change.