The purpose of the paper is to understand and explain economy competitiveness and modern pedagogic definition correlation. Education for entrepreneurship or economic development, and education for environmental sustainability, or sustainable development are seen as arguing goals in education reforms. Teachers today also encounter a number of other and equally important challenges in their work, such as educating youth for insecurity, tolerance, new technologies, peace and active citizenship, to mention but a few. National economic competitiveness is linked to intellectual and capital and is driven by knowledge, and innovation. Sustainable development requires an understanding of the complexity of the global ecosystem and of creative problem-solving the solutions searching to ‘wicked problems’ such as that of reconciling economic activity with a sustainable environment. Methodology. It is used the data from publications and reports of the European Commission, OECD, World Bank, World Economic Forum, UNESCO, International Journals in Economics and Pedagogic: American Economic Review, Journal of Education Policy, Journal of Education Change, European Journal of Education. In the article the descriptive analysis, supported by the quantitative analysis is applied. Results. It was defined that national economic competitiveness is linked to capital driven by knowledge and innovation. It was analysed the formation of Global Competitiveness Index (GCI) which is made up of over 110 variables. According to the GCI Switzerland is the most competitive economy in the world in 2015. It is highlighted the following overarching needs to: give a higher profile to the notion of interdependence: how closely one part of an ecosystem is linked to and depends upon another; making humanity more aware of its own fragility on this planet; highlight the role of cooperation: problems faced will only be resolved by international cooperation; develop the notion of a global public good: environmental sustainability can only be achieved by trans ceding particular national or individual needs. Practical implication. The results of the investigation may be used in teaching programs of Ukrainian universities, institutes and schools. Value/originality. Received conclusions will help Ukrainian pedagogues to understand the importance of new conception of knowledge, innovation and intellectual capital.