Tag: infrastructure program
President Joe Biden

What The Media Gets Wrong About The Centerpiece Of Biden's Agenda

Reprinted with permission from AlterNet

Last week's election results, which showed modest Republican gains across the nation, set off alarm bells in America's pundit class about the power of progressives in the Democratic party.

Democrats promised change, the Times contrarian Maureen Dowd complained, and instead offered "wokeness" and infighting. Bloomberg's Ramesh Ponnuru warned that even though the Virginia governor's race normally means nothing, former Democratic governor Terry McAuliffe's loss was a "portent" and "bad news" for the national party as it moved forward on a human infrastructure package.

Why? As the editorial board of the New York Times warned, with Joe Biden's $1.75 trillion Build Back Better framework, Democrats were moving too far to the left. "The concerns of more centrist Americans about a rush to spend taxpayer money, a rush to grow the government," the Times wrote, "should not be dismissed."

Indeed, a recent Gallup poll argues that 52 percent of Americans prefer a smaller government, up an alarming 11 percent since last year. But does this mean Biden should scale back his aspirations?

No.

It means Americans are radically underinformed.

In every industrialized country but the United States, government programs perform an essentially moderate task. By supporting workers, they support business. They create vital economies that support well-paying jobs. They keep workers healthy, and vulnerable family members safe. They lower tuitions, train workers so that employers don't have to, and make it possible for students to pay back modest loans at affordable rates.

And best of all — if you are one of those centrists — government programs keep people at work. There is no more graphic example of how the United States has failed at this than the number of healthy Americans who cannot, or will not, return to their jobs.

According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, as of mid-October, 10.4 million jobs are unfilled. More than 1 million of those workers are mothers who cannot find, or afford, childcare. Some missing workers — 80,000 truck drivers, for example — mean American consumers face shortages of everything from paper towels to covid tests as container ships bob offshore. And prior to the pandemic, school districts in the United States were already short 110,000 teachers.

Republicans, and some centrist Democratic senators, such as Joe Manchin of West Virginia and Kyrsten Sinema of Arizona, argue it won't. Government "giveaways," we are told, will only make Americans dependent and cripple the economy with higher taxes.

Manchin complains the US will move "toward an entitlement mentality" if Americans who can care for themselves without government help don't. And Sinema, who has raised almost $1 million in donations from lobbying groups, has given a thumbs down to higher taxes on corporations and the wealthy, making Build Back Better even harder for deficit hawks in the Democratic Party.

But it isn't clear what Republicans know that conservatives in other countries don't. The United States is the only industrialized country that does not offer paid family leave, and universal childcare, healthcare, and eldercare. In the United States, not only new parents, but sick and injured workers, are back on the job long before they are ready and able to work. And those who can't pay someone to care for family members have to cut back on consumption: experts estimate that American business may be leaving $28.5 billion a year on the table when families re-budget to account for a lost salary.

There is no question that all these policies are moderate because they benefit business. They keep families consuming, and they bring valued workers back on the job rested, healthy and focused. Similarly, knowing that elders and children are well cared for, at an affordable cost, means that families can plan for the big items that drive a healthy economy: houses, cars and appliances, and the thousands of skilled jobs the market in durable goods support.So how would Build Back Better make American business stronger?

But perhaps the biggest categories of government spending that could drive the United States economy are healthcare and education. These economic categories are not only a leading cause of national consumer indebtedness, but also of corporate spending. The cost of college doubles every nine years, and medical debt is currently pegged at $140 billion. Worse, healthcare costs are expected to rise almost six percent through 2028, well above the projected GDP of 4.3 percent.

Why is this bad for business? Because the employers who offer healthcare coverage for over 23 million American workers spent almost $14,000 per employee in 2020. That's over $3.2 trillion.

That number is only slightly less than President Biden requested to pay for a capacious package of universal programs, a number that has been whittled down to half that amount. And corporations spend billions more to administer these programs.

Last Friday, the House finally passed the $1.2 trillion hard infrastructure framework: it had yes votes from Manchin, Sinema — and even Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, Mitt Romney, 17 other conservative senators and 13 House Republicans. Why?

Because it was bold in its scope but moderate in its vision. Businesses know they can't compete in a global economy without modern transportation, roads, technology and data security, and that only federal spending and coordination makes national projects possible.

Human infrastructure — healthcare, eldercare, childcare, education and family stability — is also good for business.

It's not progressive. It's just common sense.

Claire Bond Potter is a political historian at the New School for Social Research. She is executive editor of Public Seminar and was the author of the popular blog Tenured Radical from 2006 through 2015. She lives in New York City.

Building America: How Infrastructure Can Be A Great Economic Equalizer

Building America: How Infrastructure Can Be A Great Economic Equalizer

Reprinted with permission from TomDispatch

During the Trump years, the phrase "Infrastructure Week" rang out as a sort of Groundhog Day-style punchline. What began in June 2017 as a failed effort by The Donald's White House and a Republican Senate to focus on the desperately needed rebuilding of American infrastructure morphed into a meme and a running joke in Washington.

Despite the focus in recent years on President Trump's failure to do anything for the country's crumbling infrastructure, here's a sad reality: considered over a longer period of time, Washington's political failure to fund the repairing, modernizing, or in some cases simply the building of that national infrastructure has proven a remarkably bipartisan "effort." After all, the same grand unfulfilled ambitions for infrastructure were part and parcel of the Obama White House from 2009 on and could well typify the Biden years, if Congress doesn't get its act together (or the filibuster doesn't go down in flames). The disastrous electric grid power outages that occurred during the recent deep freeze in Texas are but the latest example of the pressing need for infrastructure upgrades and investments of every sort. If nothing is done, more people will suffer, more jobs will be lost, and the economy will face drastic consequences.

Since the mid-twentieth century, when most of this country's modern infrastructure systems were first established, the population has doubled. Not only are American roads, airports, electric grids, waterways, railways and more distinctly outdated, but today's crucial telecommunications sector hasn't ever been subjected to a comprehensive broadband strategy.

Worse yet, what's known as America's "infrastructure gap" only continues to widen. The cost of what we need but haven't done to modernize our infrastructure has expanded to $5.6 trillion over the last 20 years ($3 trillion in the last decade alone), according to a report by the American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE). Some estimates now even run as high as $7 trillion.

In other words, as old infrastructure deteriorates and new infrastructure and technology are needed, the cost of addressing this ongoing problem only escalates. Currently, there is a $1-trillion backlog of (yet unapproved) deferred-maintenance funding floating around Capitol Hill. Without action in the reasonable future, certain kinds of American infrastructure could, like that Texas energy grid, soon be deemed unsafe.

Now, it's true that the U.S. continues to battle Covid-19 with more than half a million lives already lost and significant parts of the economy struggling to make ends meet. Even before the pandemic, however, America's failing infrastructure system was already costing the average household nearly $3,300 a year.

According to ASCE, "The nation's economy could see the loss of $10 trillion in GDP [gross domestic product] and a decline of more than $23 trillion in business productivity cumulatively over the next two decades if current investment trends continue." Whatever a post-pandemic economy looks like, our country is already starved for policies that offer safe, reliable, efficient, and sustainable future infrastructure systems. Such a down payment on our future is crucial not just for us, but for generations to come.

As early as 2016, ASCE researchers found that the overall number of dams with potential high-hazard status had already climbed to nearly 15,500. At the time, the organization also discovered that nearly four out of every 10 bridges in America were 50 years old or more and identified 56,007 of them as already structurally deficient. Those numbers would obviously be even higher today.

And yet, in 2021, what Americans face is hardly just a transportation crisis. The country's energy systemlargely predates the twenty-first century. The majority of American electric transmission and distribution systems were established in the 1950s and 1960s with only a 50-year life cycle. ASCE reports that, "More than 640,000 miles of high-voltage transmission lines in the lower 48 states' power grids are at full capacity." That means our systems weren't and aren't equipped to handle excess needs — especially in emergencies.

The country is critically overdue for infrastructure development in which the government and the private sector would collaborate with intention and urgency. Infrastructure could be the great equalizer in our economy, if only the Biden administration and a now-dogmatically partisan Congress had the fortitude and foresight to make it happen.

Our History Offers A Roadmap For Success

It wasn't always like this. Over the course of American history, building infrastructure has not only had a powerful economic impact, but regularly garnered bipartisan political support for the public good.

In July 1862, President Abraham Lincoln signed the Pacific Railway Act. That landmark bill provided federal support to an already ongoing private effort to build the first transcontinental railroad. Though at the time all its ramifications weren't positive — notably escalating conflicts between Native Americans and settlers pushing westward — the effort did connect the country's coastal markets, provided jobs for thousands, and helped jumpstart commerce in the West. Believe it or not, most of that transcontinental railroad line is still in use today.

In December 1928, President Calvin Coolidge signed a bill authorizing the construction of a dam in the Black Canyon of the Colorado River in the American Southwest, a region that had faced unpredictable flooding and lacked reliable electricity. Despite the stock market crash of 1929 and the start of the Great Depression, by early 1931, the private sector, with government support, had begun constructing a structure of unprecedented magnitude, known today as the Hoover Dam. As an infrastructure project, it would eventually pay for itself through the sale of the electricity that it generated. Today, that dam still provides electricity and water to tens of millions of people.

Having grasped the power of the German system of autobahns while a general in World War II, President Dwight D. Eisenhower would, under the guise of "national security," launch the Federal-Aid Highway Act of 1956, with bipartisan support, creating the interstate highway system. In its time, that system would be considered one of the "greatest public works projects in history."

In the end, that act would lead to the creation of more than 47,000 miles of roads across all 50 states, the District of Columbia, and Puerto Rico. It would have a powerful effect on commercial business activity, national defense planning, and personal travel, helping to launch whole new sectors of the economy, ranging from roadside fast-food restaurants to theme parks. According to estimates, it would return more than six dollars in economic productivity for every dollar it cost to build and support, a result any investor would be happy with.

Equivalent efforts today would undoubtedly prove to be similar economic drivers. Domestically, such investments in infrastructure have always proven beneficial. New efforts to create sustainable green energy businesses, reconfigure energy grids, and rebuild crippled transit systems for a new age would help guarantee U.S global economic competitiveness deep into the twenty-first century.

An International Race For Influence

In an interview with CNBC in February 2021, after being confirmed as the first female treasury secretary, Janet Yellen stressed the crucial need not just for a Covid-19 stimulus relief but for a sustainable infrastructure one as well.

As part of what the Biden administration has labeled its "Build Back Better" agenda, she underscored the "long-term structural problems in the U.S. economy that have resulted in inequality [and] slow productivity growth." She also highlighted how a major new focus on clean-energy investments could make the economy more competitive globally.

When it comes to infrastructure and sustainable development efforts, the U.S. is being left in the dust by its primary economic rivals. Following his first phone call with Chinese President Xi Jinping, President Biden noted to a group of senators on the Environment and Public Works Committee that, "if we don't get moving, they are going to eat our lunch." He went on to say, "They're investing billions of dollars dealing with a whole range of issues that relate to transportation, the environment, and a whole range of other things. We just have to step up."

As this country, deep in partisan gridlock, stalls on infrastructure measures of any sort, its global competitors are proceeding full speed ahead. Having helped to jumpstart its economy with projects like high-speed railways and massive new bridges, China is now accelerating its efforts to further develop its technological infrastructure. As Bloomberg reported, the Chinese are focused on supporting the build-up of "everything from wireless networks to artificial intelligence. In the master plan backed by President Jinping himself, China will invest an estimated $1.4 trillion over six years" in such projects.

And it's not just that Asian giant leaving the U.S. behind. Major trading partners like Australia, India, and Japan are projected to significantly out-invest the United States. The World Economic Forum's 2019 Global Competitiveness Report typically listed this country in 13th place among the world's nations when it came to its infrastructure quality. (It had been ranked 5th in 2002.) In 2020, that organization ranked the U.S. 32nd out of 115 countries on its Energy Transition Index.

Despite the multiple stimulus packages that Congress has passed in the Covid-19 era, no funding — not a cent — has been designated for capital-building projects. In contrast, China, Japan, and the European Union have all crafted stimulus programs in which infrastructure spending was a core component.

Infrastructure could be the engine for the most advantageous kinds of growth in this country. An optimal combination of federal and private funds, strategic partnerships, targeted infrastructure bonds, and even the creation of an infrastructure bank could help jumpstart a range of sustainable and ultimately revenue-generating businesses.

Such investment is a matter of economics, of cost versus benefit. These days, however, such calculations are both obstructed and obfuscated by politics. In the end, however, political economics comes down to getting creative about sources of funding and how to allocate them. To launch a meaningful infrastructure program would mean deciding who will produce it, who will consume it, and what kinds of transfer of wealth would be involved in the short and long run. Though the private sector certainly would help drive such a new set of programs, government funding would, as in the past, be crucial, whether under the rubric of national security, competitive innovation, sustainable clean energy, or creating a carbon-neutral future America. Any effort, no matter the label, would undoubtedly generate sustainable public and private jobs for the future.

On both the domestic and international fronts, infrastructure is big business. Wall Street, as well as the energy and construction sectors, are all eager to learn more about Biden's Build Back Better infrastructure plan, which he is expected to take up in his already delayed first joint address to Congress. Actions, not just words, are needed.

Expectations are running high about what might prove to be a multi-trillion-dollar infrastructure initiative. Such anticipation has already elevated the stock prices of construction companies, as well as shares in the sustainable energy sector.

There are concerns, to be sure. A big infrastructure package might never make it through an evenly split Senate, where partisanship is the name of the game. Some economists also fear that it could bring on inflation. There is, of course, debate over the role of the private sector in any such plan, as well as horse-trading about what kinds of projects should get priority. But the reality is that this country desperately needs infrastructure that, in turn, can secure a sustainable and green future. Someday this will have to be done, and the longer the delay, the more those costs are likely to rise. The future revenues and economic benefits from a solid infrastructure package should be key drivers in any post-pandemic economy.

The biggest asset managers in the country are already seeing more money flowing into their infrastructure and sustainable-energy funds. Financing for such deals in the private sector is also increasing. Any significant funding on the public side will only spur and augment that financing. Such projects could drive the economy for years to come. They would run the gamut from establishing smart grids and expanding broadband reach to building electric transmission systems that run off more sustainable energy sources, while manufacturing cleaner vehicles and ways to use them. Going big with futuristic transit projects like Virgin's Hyperloop, a high-speed variant of a vacuum train, or Elon Musk's initiative for the development of carbon-capture technology, could even be included in a joint drive to create the necessary clean-energy infrastructure and economy of the future.

Polling also shows that such infrastructure spending has broad public support, even if, in Congress, much-needed bipartisan backing for such a program remains distinctly in question. Still, in February, the ranking Republican senator on the environment and public works committee, West Virginia's Shelley Moore Capito, said that "transportation infrastructure is the platform that can drive economic growth — all-American jobs, right there, right on the ground — now and in the future, and improve the quality of life for everyone on the safety aspects." Meanwhile, the committee's chairman, Democratic Senator Tom Carper of Delaware, stressed that "the burdens of poor road conditions are disproportionately shouldered by marginalized communities." He pointed out that "low-income families and peoples of color are frequently left behind or left out by our investments in infrastructure, blocking their access to jobs and education opportunities."

Sadly, given the way leadership in Washington wasted endless months dithering over the merits of supporting American workers during a pandemic, it may be too much to hope that a transformative bipartisan infrastructure deal will materialize.

The Great Economic Equalizer

Here's a simple reality: a strong American economy is dependent on infrastructure. That means more than just a "big umbrella" effort focused on transportation and electricity. Yes, airports, railroads, electrical grids, and roadways are all-important economic drivers, but in the twenty-first-century world, high-capacity communications systems are also essential to economic prosperity, as are distribution channels of various sorts. At the moment, there's a water main break every two minutes in the U.S. Nearly six billion gallons of treated water are lost daily thanks to such breaks. Situations like the one in Flint, Michigan, in which economic pressure and bankruptcy eventually led a city to expose thousands of its children to poisonous drinking water, will become increasingly unavoidable in a country with an ever-deteriorating infrastructure.

The great economic equalizer is this: the more efficient our infrastructure systems become, the less they cost, and the more they can be readily used by those across the income spectrum. What American history shows since the time of Abraham Lincoln is that, in periods of economic turmoil, major infrastructure building or rebuilding will not only pay for itself but support the economy for generations to come.

For the next generation, it's already clear that clean and sustainable energy will be crucial to achieving a more equal, economically prosperous, and less climate-challenged future. A renewables-based rebuilding of the economy and the creation of the jobs to go with it would be anything but some niche set of activities in the usual infrastructure spectrum. It would be the future. High-paying jobs within the sustainable energy sector are already booming. The Bureau of Labor Statistics reported that among the occupations projected to have the fastest employment growth from 2016 to 2026 will be those in "green" work.

Wall Street and big tech companies are also paying attention. Amazon, Google, and Facebook have become the world's biggest corporate purchasers of clean energy and are now planning for some of the world's most transformational climate targets. That will mean smaller companies will also be able to enter that workspace as innovation and infrastructure drive economic incentives.

The Next Generation

It may be ambitious to expect that we've left the Groundhog Day vortex of "infrastructure week" behind us, but the critical demand for a new Infrastructure Age confronts us now. From Main Street to Wall Street, the need and the growing market for a sustainable, efficient, and clean future couldn't be more real. An abundance of avenues to finance such a future are available and it makes logical business sense to pursue them.

It's obvious enough what should be done. The only question, given American politics in 2021, is: Can it be done?

The economy of tomorrow will be built upon the infrastructure measures of today. You can't see the value of stocks from space, nor can you see the physical value of what you've left to the next generation from stat sheets. But from the International Space Station you can see the Hoover Dam and even San Francisco's Golden Gate Bridge. What will future generations see that we've left behind? If the answer is nothing, that will be a tragedy of our age.

Nomi Prins, a former Wall Street executive, is a TomDispatch regular. Her latest book is Collusion: How Central Bankers Rigged the World. She is currently working on her new book, Permanent Distortion. She is also the author of All the Presidents' Bankers: The Hidden Alliances That Drive American Power and five other books. Special thanks go to researcher Craig Wilson for his superb assistance.

Trump’s Biggest Lies? Everything He Promised And Failed To Do

Trump’s Biggest Lies? Everything He Promised And Failed To Do

Reprinted with permission from DCReport.

Donald Trump’s latest flip-flops on healthcare and the Mexican border continue a pattern of promises, and reversals, that gets far too little attention. His flip-flops show that Trump ignores the interests of the party he latched onto in favor of whatever crazy idea pops into his head.

Although at his rallies Trump delights his uninformed supporters with claims that he’s followed through on his campaign promises—The Wall—he is actually delivering very little.

In all of these, Trump has demonstrated that he knows nothing of policy or partisan agendas, only what serves himself. He does not know the pulse of America, only of the true believers of his cult of personality.

For Republican officeholders, down Trump’s path lies political death. We saw a sign of coming disaster for the GOP last fall when Democrat running for the House garnered 4.3 million more votes than Republicans—a greater popular vote margin than Hillary Clinton’s over Trump in 2016, though he won the Electoral College.

Trump inflicted heavy damage last week on Republican politicians when the Justice Department stopped defending the Affordable Care Act, a.k.a. Obamacare. Now Justice seeks to kill Obamacare in the courts.

Only an idiot, or a narcissist, would fail to realize the widespread fear of losing health insurance and related fear of being uninsurable because of a pre-existing condition, something virtually universal among those from middle age to 65, when Medicare kicks in. Pregnancy, by the way, is a pre-existing condition.

A conspiratorial cynic might think that the Democrats secretly planted the idea in Trump’s jumbled mine that repealing Obamacare is the path to a second term.

The other thoughtless flip-flop came when Trump declared he may shut down the Mexican border not just to asylum seekers, but to all commerce. If that happens, say adios to many fruits in winter, not to mention many of the 1.2 million American jobs that depend on trade with Mexico and, in turn, many jobs that depend on the incomes of those million-plus workers.

In 2020, every House Republican is up for election. So are 22 of 53 Republican senators. In addition, nine Republican governors face voters in 2019 or 2020, seven of them vulnerable to losing.

If Trump continues flailing about, in November 2020 we’ll find out just how big of a mistake Republican politicians made by not standing up to him.