America may lead the pack as a global super power, but according to a report released in December 2021 by the Information Technology & Innovation Foundation (ITIF), a Washington, D.C. think tank, the U.S. workforce has fallen behind in the digital skills department, an integral marker for being productive members of the 21st century workforce. Digital skills comparisons with other nations find U.S. performance mixed & increasingly underwhelming. In one 2012 survey of 14 countries, conducted by the Organization for Economic Co-Operation & Development (OECD)— a collaborative of 37 democracies with market-based economies working together to develop policy standards to promote sustainable economic growth, the U.S. ranked fourth behind New Zealand and Mexico. Meanwhile, a 2021 study by Coursera, an online education provider, ranked the U.S. 29th out of 100 countries & noted that U.S. digital skills proficiency falls behind that of many countries in Europe and Asia. And while the U.S. isn’t worse than the developing world, it is worse than the developed world, says the report. As the digital economy contributes more & more to the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) of all nations, digital skills will become increasingly important in the 21st century, particularly in the manufacturing sector, as jobs in U.S. manufacturing increasingly demand a facility with digital skills, a key indicator for individual workers & U.S. manufacturing industries alike, to be both competitive and productive.
