Once called “The miracle of the Caribbean,” Puerto Rico was a showcase of study for development and governance to other nations within the region. The years after the Second World War brought an economic boom led by external investment and capital-intensive industries. This model was very successful in industrializing the Puerto Rican economy. However, in the last decades this economic model was affected by competition, globalization, free trade and the closure of Puerto Rico’s tax advantage in the American market. Today the question that urges to be discussed is: How to improve our economic model to become a global competitor?

Our goal for this panel is to present other economics models analogous to the Puerto Rican case, as possible paths for the Puerto Rico’s economic policy. We want to explore how these models could be modifiable to the Puerto Rican realities. We plan to examine the cases of Finland, Ireland and Singapore because they represent direct competitors to PR and also because they have singular characteristics (Location, proximity to important markets, prior stages of stagnation, etc) like Puerto Rico. We also plan to explore government initiatives in this area and evaluate their success and failures.