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That articles doesn't make an argument against infrastructural development.
The point that can be made is that those highway construction projects could be said to be a waste because they are trying to find something to construct even though it seems they don't have no real needs for any new interstate expansion.
I often hear people talking about how we need more stimulus construction on U.S infrastructure to get the economy moving again. Many talk about all the construction that happened during the depression under FDR as an example and all the spending that came with WWII.
Ok but what happens when a country enters a depression and yet they really don't have a need to have new roads,airports,schools and hospitals built? Say a country already has enough of those things already built. What do they do then?
then that hypothetical country doesn't build them.
personally, i don't think that hypothetical country is us. Our airports are awful, our interstates are poor, our passenger train service is awful, our urban mass transit is awful.
We should have had a transportation infrastructure stimulus in 2000 when the tech bubble burst, but instead we decided to funnel all that capital into building McMansions.
So we take money from the people to pay the people, so they can pay taxes? Does that really makes sense?
It doesn't make sense as long as you hold to a liner view of the flow of money through an economy.
You "take" from some so that they may buy from others, who in turn will buy from another group, who will buy from yet another. Eventually the money "taken" returns to those who it was "taken" in the way of higher sales and profits.
Think of it in religious terms God creates the rain, the rain creates the plants, the plants nourish the cow the cow is slaughtered and eaten by man, the man contracts ecoli, dies and goes back to God.
Ok but what happens when a country enters a depression and yet they really don't have a need to have new roads,airports,schools and hospitals built? Say a country already has enough of those things already built. What do they do then?
If you think think outside the box, as Roosevelt did, while infrastructure received the lion's share of funding, there was a lot more than just infrastructure that went along with the New Deal. There was funding for 1, 371 artist who created significant works for permanent display in public buildings.
The Federal Writers Project employed 6,685 writers including Ralph Ellison, Richard Wright, Studs Terkel, John Cheever, Saul Bellow, and Zorea Neale Hurston.
The Federal Theather Project employed 12,700 theater workers in 31 states producing 1,200 plays and providing an opportunity for 100 new playwrights. The Federal Music Project gave jobs to 16,000 musicians who performed 5,000 performances a week, producing 5,500 new works and providing music instruction for 132,000 children. It was also responsible to recording American folk music, much of which would have been lost to history without federal funding.
The Farm Services Administration supported the work of some of Americans greatest photographers, Walker Evans, Carl Mydans, Gordon Parks, and Dorothea Lange and Ansel Adams who produce work during the period that is still consider some of the seminal works of photography made during the 20th Century.
If a nation doesn't have need of infrastructure it can never have enough art and cultural works and if that is too frivolous for your taste the same could be applied to science and technology. Thousands of engineers, and scientist could be funded for innumerable entailing basic research and education. The only thing limiting what beneficial programs that could be funded as part of an economic stimulus is political imagination, something that is in shorter these days that the supply of jobs.
The point that can be made is that those highway construction projects could be said to be a waste because they are trying to find something to construct even though it seems they don't have no real needs for any new interstate expansion.
The point that article is mostly making is "environmental concerns" and that the projects aren't what they could be, not that the infrastructural projects aren't needed. That would be your claim.
I asked earlier on whether America should have stayed put with infrastructure of the 1930s-40s and only maintained what existed then? Is that what you think should have been?
I often hear people talking about how we need more stimulus construction on U.S infrastructure to get the economy moving again. Many talk about all the construction that happened during the depression under FDR as an example and all the spending that came with WWII.
But you cannot compare those.
I live just a few blocks from parks built by the WPA. I met people who were employed through the WPA. The money went to the WPA to the worker and in this area, they built a football stadium for Lockland High School, they built bridges (still in use) in western Hamilton County where I grew up, the parks I visit now and many other things.
There was no middle man.
What Obama is doing now is throwing money into the air and seeing who can catch it. That isn't what FDR did.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Motion
Ok but what happens when a country enters a depression and yet they really don't have a need to have new roads,airports,schools and hospitals built? Say a country already has enough of those things already built. What do they do then?
Some would pray for a leader, but an intelligent person would actually elect one.
Obama failed as a leader. He could have actually done something, but he is not a leader.
I would have told you that we were going to work our way out of the recession and that I had a plan to shift 85% of all freight from over-the-road trucks to rail.
The Teamsters Union would have a hissy fit, but I'd find some way to smack them down. Maybe have the IRS, FBI, SEC and others crawl up their asses for a while.
I would have put people to work clearing areas to lay new track, put them to work laying new track, put them to work clearing vegetation off of existing unused track, put them to work refurbishing and repairing existing unused track, put them to work repairing and refurbish rail-road crossings,
but them to work building flat-bed rail cars, tanker rail cars, HAZMAT rail cars, car carriers, freight cars, specialty cars etc etc etc.
I would have put them to work building new locomotives, put them to work building all the specialty equipment used in the railroad industry, put them to work building new rail hubs, rail centers, and trans-shipment points, I would have put people to work in those news rail hubs, rail centers, and trans-shipment points, I would have put IT people to work coming up with a shipment tracking system, rail tracking system, rail scheduling system, freight delivery system, safety monitoring system etc etc etc.
I would have put people to work building new electric-diesel inner-city cabs and put them to work building new trailers to haul freight from the rail hubs, rail yards and trans-shipment centers to businesses, industry, wholesalers and retailers.
Thousands of workers would need to be hired as engineers, conductors, maintenance, freight handlers, yard workers, IT, clerical, management etc etc etc.
And not only is everyone working (and those jobs cannot be off-shored), but you benefit from reduced costs. Why? Because now there is less demand for diesel fuel, so it costs farmers less, so it costs you less to buy food, and because you don't have to worry about oil prices affecting the costs of shipping and increasing the prices you pay for goods, you pay less.
And your interstates and roads are less congested, and there are few accidents and fewer deaths and injuries from accidents, and there is less damage to the roads, so cities, counties and States can spend that money on something else instead of repairing the same section of Interstate 75 over and over and over and over and over.
And there's less pollution. And the truckers? They don't lose their jobs, they just shift from over-the-road to short haul. If the like the long trips, then they can train and learn how to be an engineer or conductor.
Obama could have done that, but he is a man totally lacking in vision, except for his delusions of grandeur.
Originally Posted by tofurkey Dams, bridges and plumbing throughout the U.S. is in need of upgrading or repair. There's plenty that needs to be done, too much to overcome to get a project started.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Kirdik
Apparently Obama doesn't think so. According to Paul Ryan only 6% of the stimulus money has been spent on construction projects.
I guess no one give them the 'Gentlemen, get your shovels ready....'
I guess no one give them the 'Gentlemen, get your shovels ready....'
Like Obama once joked "turned out shovel-ready was not as shovel-ready as we expected"
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God creates the rain, the rain creates the plants, the plants nourish the cow the cow is slaughtered and eaten by man, the man contracts ecoli, dies and goes back to God.
