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The article gives two reasons. The first starts in the paragraph that begins with The first underlying driver of U.S. infrastructure costs is that the U.S. h
by dkhenry 7y ago
The article gives two reasons. The first starts in the paragraph that begins with
The first underlying driver of U.S. infrastructure costs is that the U.S. has felt so rich as a country that, for decades, we spent freely on infrastructure and never asked serious questions about the return on that investment
And then lists some of the things we spend freely on that aren't really necessary. The second reason is
The second underlying driver of U.S. infrastructure costs is how deeply embedded infrastructure spending is within our model of economic growth.
both of those essentially boil down to we spend so much because the market is set up to encourage us to spend a lot. Probably not the answer you were looking for, but at the end of the day we spend so much money because we have set up the market to enable high prices.
- someguydave 7y agoThe underlying factor really is that the people in charge of spending infrastructure money are not really incentivized to be careful or ask tough questions about how it is being spent. Furthermore, they are often bound by piles of regulations and restrictions on their freedom for contracting the work, so they also lack agency.
- IfOnlyYouKnew 7y agoYeah, that's just the old and cynical "everyone-is-corrupt" talking-point. It fails rather obviously because (a) the article is comparing costs across countries, and other countries haven't found some magic system to increase accountability of politicians and beaurocrats that goes beyond not re-electing them. And, (b), there are plenty of incentives for decision-makers to keep costs down. Don't you think the governor or Mayor of New York would crow endlessly if they managed to build subway <x> or tunnel <y> for a fraction of the usual costs? Have you noticed how California's high-speed rail project and its cost overruns have been terrible for three governors in a row?
- liability 7y agoWhether anybody is practicing witchcraft or any other form of magic is beyond the point; it should be obvious to anybody who's not totally naive that some countries have more corruption than others.
- someguydave 7y ago>would crow endlessly Sure, so why doesn't this happen more often? The simplest explanation is that elected politician's influence is small compared to the collective bureaucracy's power to do what it was going to do anyway. And yes, everyone who is handed a pile of third-party cash to spend on other people does not usually have very good incentives to make the most efficient choices, and doubly so when their personal agency is further restricted by a mass of regulation.
- peterwwillis 7y ago> the people in charge of spending infrastructure money are not really incentivized to be careful The citizens are the only ones who would have such incentives. They're paying for it & they're using it. They aren't supposed to be piggy banks to jiggle to pay for things, they should also be involved in what gets paid for and how. Expecting a bureaucracy to be efficient is like expecting a monopoly to be fair, so the citizenry needs to be more engaged.
- ummonk 7y agoThe first reason doesn't explain why infrastructure causes more today (when the US doesn't feel as rich) than it did when the US was making large scale infrastructure investments. The second reason seems flat out wrong especially when you compare e.g. the large scale infrastructure investments China is making to fuel its economic growth and compare that to the US where economic growth seems to be largely based on quantitative easing.
- xvilka 7y agoIt is notable, not only China does that. Almost any single country, just within different scales. If you take Japan, Europe, they build infrastructure too, and a lot of it.