Most of the current news around Donald Trump involves his recent indictment. But aside from the easy news that this is generating for the news outlets and tabloids, could some of Donald Trump’s ideas, such as his freedom cities, usher in a new wave of technological innovation, dampening the threat of nations such as China?
The stock market as a measure of growth
Despite all the detractors of President Donald Trump during his term in office, the American stock market staged an impressive performance, something that will not have gone unnoticed and in contrast to what seems to be a recession happening during Joe Biden’s term in office.
The US stock market performed well during Donald Trump’s presidency, with the S&P 500 rising 67% between his inauguration in 2017 and his last full day in office in January 2021. The Dow Jones Industrial Average gained 56% during Trump’s presidency, which is the eighth-best return for any single term of a presidency, whereas Biden’s effect has been mixed. In the first 100 days of Biden’s presidency, the stock market saw a rise of 9.3%, marking the best first-100-day stretch for stocks under a new president since World War II. The S&P 500 posted better returns in Biden’s first 100 days than under any president since World War II. However, as of November 2022, the S&P 500 had fallen by 1.2% since Biden took office in January 2021, marking the second-worst performance during a president’s first 656 calendar days in office.
The US markets have a high weighting towards technology stocks and, therefore, could be argued are a bellwether of faith in a technological future. A healthy investment climate is great for stocks and companies involved in creating our future; one of those futures is a quantum future. It all connects a well-functioning investment climate leads to new company formations and new technologies to be developed because of funding through a supportive ecosystem and environment.
Donald Backs Quantum
For all the naysayers out there, there is one thing that DJT wants to do: put the United States front and Centre in the battle for world technological dominance against inroads from the likes of China. President Trump is no stranger to Quantum Computing and associated technologies.
Donald Trump has made several mentions of quantum computing. In 2018, Trump signed the National Quantum Initiative Act, which authorizes $1.2 billion over five years to accelerate quantum computing research and development. Trump has frequently pushed to increase funding for AI and quantum, with his proposed budget earlier in 2020 doubling nondefense AI spending from roughly $973 million to… Trump’s administration also established three new quantum institutes, with Trump’s Chief Technology Officer, Michael Kratsios, stating that the US will remain the global home for QIS research. In addition, Trump explained quantum computing while visiting the Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics in Waterloo, Ontario, where he announced a $50 million budget increase for the institute. Finally, a significant strand of the National Quantum Initiative is to train a new generation in quantum-related subjects.
President Joe Biden has also been popularising and backing Quantum Technologies. On May 4, 2022, President Biden signed two Presidential directives to advance national initiatives in quantum information science (QIS) and maintain United States leadership in QIS. He also signed a National Security Memorandum (NSM) to combat the risks of quantum computing to the nation’s security and maintain U.S. leadership in quantum information sciences. In addition, President Biden signed an Executive Order on Enhancing the National Quantum Initiative Advisory Committee to advance the National Quantum Initiative (NQI) to enable transformative advances in knowledge and technology. Furthermore, President Biden signed the Quantum Computing Cybersecurity Preparedness Act into law in December 2022, designed to secure federal government systems and data against the threat of quantum-enabled data breaches.
Flying Cars and Freedom Cities in Quantum Leap Forward
It’s a much cliched technological innovation that has never come to pass and for many, is a laughable metric of technological innovation – so when Donald Trump mentions flying cars, it might raise a chuckle from a few as they consider is a preposterous idea. But what is the history of flying cars, and why don’t we have flying cars today?
“We wanted flying cars, instead we got 140 characters,”
Peter Thiel
Coincidentally, Trump’s plan, as first reported by POLITICO’s, also includes a proposal to “reopen the frontier” by building ten new “Freedom Cities” on federal land. In his speech at CPAC at the beginning of March, the former president’s unveiled his plan for the technological “Quantum Leap”.
Elon Musk chimed in on flying cars, but that is beside the point. The point of Trump’s push is to accelerate the US’s process of innovation. As backers of Quantum Technologies, we have seen that Trump is no slouch when it comes down to Quantum, as we have exemplified. But we think that Trump understands the threat from other nations more concretely and, therefore, will propel Quantum technologies to a new level if he is elected again for a second term. Despite the haters, we think Donald Trump “gets it”, and if he gets a second term will set the Tech Landscape on fire as Quantum becomes the accelerant.
As the risks from China are dominating headlines around technologies, including chips (semi-conductors), expect Quantum to fall under that umbrella and as a result, Quantum Computing could end up weaponized to the point where it is given as much emphasis as the Moon Mission during the cold war. I doubt many in the Quantum Industry would complain.
