Public good construction costs have increased for reasons other than high western labor costs. Take for example this: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=217

Public good construction costs have increased for reasons other than high western labor costs. Take for example this: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21716312 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21716312 Alon Levy mainly cites the flawed design-build model where design and construction contracts are awarded to the same firm as well as the comparatively high cost of TBM use for deep stations / tunnels versus cut-and-cover construction techniques for simpler, shallow stations.