Marina Whitman spoke on a panel of nonprofit and private sector executives, organized by Crain's Detroit Business and Honigman Miller Schwartz and Cohn LLP, which focused on issues facing businesses in the wake of the recent presidential election.
The roundtable was moderated by Crain's Executive Editor Cindy Goodaker, who began by asking the panelists what should be on the minds of businesses in the immediate future.
"Partly, of course, what looms biggest is the fiscal cliff," Whitman told Crain's. "But in addition to that, the fact is Europe is in the dumps and it's not at all clear when and how it's going to emerge from it, China is slowing down somewhat, Japan has been stagnant for so long that it's hard to know when they're going to emerge, so the notion of having our exports pick up is also on somewhat thin ice."
Whitman also discussed the need to address long-term economic issues like the future of entitlement programs and the growing costs of health care.
[Read the full roundtable coverage]