Hillary Clinton is giving a big speech today on the economy. One of her big points is that the government needs to spend a lot of money rebuilding America's infrastructure. It's not a point unique to Clinton; Trump also talks about the need for rebuilding infrastructure. That leads to a big question: which of these two could actually do that infrastructure work? Let's examine the facts.
1. In 2009, president Obama got Congress to pass the massive Stimulus bill. The federal government was going to spend just under a trillion dollars to stimulate the economy. The biggest chunk of that spending was supposedly directed at funding what Obama called "shovel ready jobs". Remember those shovel ready jobs? The reality was that something close to a quarter of a trillion dollars was supposed to pay for new infrastructure construction. Congress authorized the money, so it was just up to the Obama administration to get the work underway.
In actual fact, only a small portion of the funds went for new infrastructure projects. Most of it went instead for repairs and other work that was already scheduled by local governments. For example, in my town, the money was spent on repaving work on a five block stretch of street. The repaving was just part of the annual maintenance work done by the town. Across the country, there were almost no new projects that were completed due to the massive spending.
2. Since 2009, president Obama has repeatedly talked about building infrastructure. Unlike with the Stimulus bill, the administration had plenty of time to compile a list of projects and to prepare them for construction. Instead doing that work, however, Obama stuck with talking about infrastructure while doing nothing to get the work underway. Across the country, construction of new infrastructure projects are at a multi-year low. In other words, Obama didn't even keep construction of infrastructure steady; instead, it declined.
3. The review of the Obama failure on infrastructure is important because Hillary Clinton has no plan to get the work done either. She talks about setting up a new bureaucracy with an Infrastructure Bank, but that would just fund the work, not actually get it done. During Obama's years in office, Congress funded more dollars of infrastructure work than during the term of any other president in history, so the problem is not with the funding. Hillary, however, has no plan to actually get the work performed.
4. Trump also has announced no plan to carry out the infrastructure work, but there is one big difference between Hillary and Trump on this point. Trump has a record of being able to get big construction projects designed, built and completed. His greatest strength in business has always been his ability to get daring projects completed on time and under budget. If Trump says he will rebuild America's infrastructure, he has the track record to let us believe that he will accomplish that task.
So everyone agrees the more infrastructure construction is needed and beneficial for the economy. Hillary has no plan to achieve this, no record of past accomplishment and she wants to continue the Obama method which led to total failure. Trump has not announced a plan to achieve this, but he has a lifetime record of successful completion of just this sort of work. Clearly, Trump is preferable on this issue.
1. In 2009, president Obama got Congress to pass the massive Stimulus bill. The federal government was going to spend just under a trillion dollars to stimulate the economy. The biggest chunk of that spending was supposedly directed at funding what Obama called "shovel ready jobs". Remember those shovel ready jobs? The reality was that something close to a quarter of a trillion dollars was supposed to pay for new infrastructure construction. Congress authorized the money, so it was just up to the Obama administration to get the work underway.
In actual fact, only a small portion of the funds went for new infrastructure projects. Most of it went instead for repairs and other work that was already scheduled by local governments. For example, in my town, the money was spent on repaving work on a five block stretch of street. The repaving was just part of the annual maintenance work done by the town. Across the country, there were almost no new projects that were completed due to the massive spending.
2. Since 2009, president Obama has repeatedly talked about building infrastructure. Unlike with the Stimulus bill, the administration had plenty of time to compile a list of projects and to prepare them for construction. Instead doing that work, however, Obama stuck with talking about infrastructure while doing nothing to get the work underway. Across the country, construction of new infrastructure projects are at a multi-year low. In other words, Obama didn't even keep construction of infrastructure steady; instead, it declined.
3. The review of the Obama failure on infrastructure is important because Hillary Clinton has no plan to get the work done either. She talks about setting up a new bureaucracy with an Infrastructure Bank, but that would just fund the work, not actually get it done. During Obama's years in office, Congress funded more dollars of infrastructure work than during the term of any other president in history, so the problem is not with the funding. Hillary, however, has no plan to actually get the work performed.
4. Trump also has announced no plan to carry out the infrastructure work, but there is one big difference between Hillary and Trump on this point. Trump has a record of being able to get big construction projects designed, built and completed. His greatest strength in business has always been his ability to get daring projects completed on time and under budget. If Trump says he will rebuild America's infrastructure, he has the track record to let us believe that he will accomplish that task.
So everyone agrees the more infrastructure construction is needed and beneficial for the economy. Hillary has no plan to achieve this, no record of past accomplishment and she wants to continue the Obama method which led to total failure. Trump has not announced a plan to achieve this, but he has a lifetime record of successful completion of just this sort of work. Clearly, Trump is preferable on this issue.
No comments:
Post a Comment