Here’s a presidential candidate many of us could rally around: He campaigned to cut taxes and regulations on businesses, develop new industries and markets, encourage — encourage! — private equity and hedge funds, establish free trade zones, and boost economic growth.

Unfortunately, he’s not a candidate in the 2008 American presidential election; rather, he is the newly elected president of South Korea. Lee Myung-bak’s pro-business platform won him the support of Koreans who have been disappointed in their country’s 4.5% growth rate in recent years. (Admittedly, other countries in the region set a pretty high bar.) Mr. Lee was formerly head of the powerhouse auto manufacturer Hyundai, so it is assumed that he understands how to make things grow.

A piece in Tuesday’s Wall Street Journal underscores the enlightenment of the Korean voters. It does not concern that country’s economy, but rather Korea’s practice of awarding places in the nation’s private elementary schools by lottery. That’s right: To gain admission to the best-performing schools in Korea, kindergartners are not asked to sign their names or put puzzle pieces in place. Instead, their parents have to select the right ball out of a bowl. It’s like winning at Bingo.

Why would the authorities require that the coveted spots be allocated in this manner? Because, according to the Journal article, the country is still recovering from the class system under which Korea operated until it was taken over by the Japanese in the early 1900s. Koreans are apparently obsessed with equality and fairness. The author points out that the presidential candidates also faced regulations designed to level the playing field: All campaign posters had to be the same size and had to be displayed in groups.

Here’s the point: Even in a country dedicated to equal opportunity, lower tax rates and giving businesses free rein to compete are valued and seen as positive for the nation as a whole.

Not so in America. For reasons that date to the labor skirmishes of the late 19th century, Americans still view gains by business as somehow detrimental to labor and to the country as a whole. The prevailing opinion among Democrats, at least, is that businesses have been treated much too generously under President Bush, and it is high time to rein them in. The unfortunate subprime mortgage mess will only exacerbate this tendency.

Consider the economic platforms of the leading candidates in America. The only one, to my knowledge, to advocate lower taxes for corporations is Mitt Romney. Possibly because he had a successful career in the private sector, the former Massachusetts governor is aware that American corporations must thrive if the American people are going to continue to fill their Christmas stockings.

Mr. Romney often cites in his speeches the fact that America has the second-highest corporate tax rate among member nations of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development. (It is no shock, based on comparative growth, to find that Japan still has the highest.) This might surprise many Americans who have come to believe that our government has been especially openhanded to business. In fact, since Prime Minister Thatcher cut the corporate tax rate charge in Britain to 35% from 52% in the early 1980s, and America initiated a similar move under President Reagan, a wave of similar reductions has spread around the world. America has actually become a laggard in corporate tax relief.

In 2006, the Tax Foundation reports, five countries cut their corporate tax rates; eight more, including Germany, will have lower rates going into 2008. By contrast, the corporate rate in America has not changed in 12 years — it is one of only two OECD countries not to lower its rate between 1994 and 2006. These days, Japan’s rate of 39.5% is only fractionally higher than the American rate at 39.3%. (All figures include the weighted impact of regional or state taxes.) Those levels compare with the OECD average of 28.5%. Between 2000 and 2006, not one country in the OECD raised its corporate tax rate; instead, the average reduction was 15.5%.

Germany, France, and Britain have reduced corporate tax rates in order to compete more effectively with former members of the eastern bloc, such as Poland and Estonia. Interestingly, just as newborn nations have an opportunity to invest in new technology and infrastructure, in many cases they also have taken hold of new economic thinking. While liberal American academics continue to ridicule supply-side economics, new fast-growing countries have embraced such notions. Astonishingly, 18 countries now have a flat tax.

It is not just corporate tax policies that will be under review as the Bush program expires. Taxation of dividends and capital gains also will become a hot topic. Again, America is not in the lead in this arena. Austria, Belgium, the Czech Republic, Hong Kong, and New Zealand are just some of the long list of countries that have no individual capital gains tax.

There is a very good chance that a year from now we will be about to inaugurate a Democrat as president. It is also likely that the new president will be eyeing corporate taxes as a possible source of funds for universal health care or some other laudable social goal. One hopes that common sense will prevail before we kill our precious goose.

Perhaps the new president will be convinced to visit Ireland. Once the poorest country in the European Union, Ireland has spent the last 15 years trying to attract businesses. Its corporate tax rate dropped to the lowest of any OECD nation, 12.5%, from 40% in 1993. In response, the country has grown at rates as high as 12% per annum and is now a net contributor to the OECD. No longer do Irish youths flee the country in search of work. Instead, Dublin has become a cosmopolitan financial and business center, attracting young people from all over the world.

America had best pay attention to the tax and business policies of others. We are in competition as never before, and we need every weapon at our disposal, including informed leadership.

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