Ex-McDonald's CEO: Kids need a global education
If the United States is to be a viable competitor in the global marketplace, we must do a better job educating our children, according to former McDonald's CEO Ed Rensi.
Rensi spoke on several topics Thursday to a group of more than 500 suburban business leaders at a luncheon in Woodridge hosted by 18 West suburban chambers of commerce. He said the U.S. is falling behind the rest of the world because we are not doing a good job in teaching our children the importance of learning on a global scale.
“If we don't teach our kids that learning is a lifelong experience, we will fail in everything we do in society,” said Rensi, who ran the Oak Brook-based fast-food chain from 1984 to1998. “And we need to teach them not only the facts of the world, but how we fit in with the rest of the world.”
He said our children are the “most vulnerable people in our society” so it is especially important to think and to continue learning once they are out of school. Learning on the larger level becomes more important because all business will be global in the future, he added.
“You can access money and resources anywhere in the world at any time,” Rensi said. “Chambers need to focus on the business of tomorrow, because the future will be dependent on the global economy.”
He pointed out that China, for example, does not have enough agricultural land to support its people with food. However, the country has bought millions of acres of farmland in Brazil, where it operates agribusinesses to feed its population back home. Likewise, he added, Japan has no natural resources, yet has been able to build itself into the world's third largest economy through the global marketplace.
In order to meet the educational needs, Rensi suggested that U.S. students should travel and study abroad to learn how world cultures function. He noted that is no different from countries such as China sending their students to universities in the U.S., United Kingdom and Canada.
“What did (China) do? They sent their kids to Stanford, Harvard, London and Canada,” Rensi said. “Our kids are staying here now.
“I love them to death, but I do not want them working for me,” he added. “I want them working for Hyundai, the world's biggest shipbuilder with a global reach.”
Rensi said this gap stems from the fact that education in the U.S. has gone underfunded for many years. As a result, he said, we need to be willing to pay more in taxes to support better education systems and opportunities.
“At some point in your life you've got to stop worrying about what you've got, and what you're going to get,” he said. “It's not sustainable, folks. We better start biting the hard, bitter root of what the consequences are, or our kids are not going to have a chance.
“Our kids are the most important thing we can focus on today, because this is a generational issue,” he said. “It's not the four-year cycle until the next presidential election.”
Rensi, who is now CEO of Tom & Eddie's Better Burgers based in Woodridge, later joked with the audience when he was asked why he decided to start a new hamburger business.
“I got tired of eating bad hamburgers,” he said.
The chambers that participated in the event included Addison, Bartlett, Bloomingdale, Bolingbrook, Carol Stream, Darien, Downers Grove, Elmhurst, Glen Ellyn, Hinsdale, Lisle, Lombard, Villa Park, Western DuPage, Westmont, Wheaton, Winfield and Woodridge.