[Themaintainers] Joe Biden as Mr. Fix It

[David Albrecht]

I have to admit feeling rather divided about this whole thing. I wonder
what others think.

On one hand, the $2 trillion headline number getting thrown around is
astoundingly large. That is 1000 separate $2 billion projects. If you set
even a moderate bar of accepting 25% of proposed projects, that means
reviewing 4000 separate $2 billion projects in the next couple years. A $2
billion infrastructure project is a *big* project. I have yet to see any
entity anywhere able to deploy that kind of money so quickly without huge
amounts of waste. And keep in mind, there is no credible plan on the table
to fix Social Security or Medicare, even as the CBO's baseline projection
<https://www.cbo.gov/publication/56977> has US debt reaching 200% of GDP by
2050, roughly double the amount (adjusted for the size of the economy)
after WWII.

And inflation is coming. I'm not parroting the news here--this is all
firsthand. In-N-Out Burger near my place here in California can't fill
positions starting people at $17/hr. Construction projects in the upper
midwest are getting shelved because lumber prices have doubled in the last
12 months (my friend's dad owns a general contractor). More and more I see
billboards advertising not goods or services, but open jobs. I was looking
at replacing a roof on a building and the sheet metal guys told me their
lead times are 4-6 weeks just to construct a curb to put under a rooftop
HVAC unit. An electrician at one of my places is quoting $600 (nearly
double last year) to jumper two meter entry points because base materials
(copper and conduit) have gotten so expensive.

On the other hand, it might be true that a big thing, like a high-speed
rail network, just isn't possible without bold federal action. I think
Kennedy had a lot to do with why the Apollo program was prioritized. I just
can't shake this feeling that we're using yesterday's economic tools to try
to fix today's problems, for which they're wholly unsuited. We can't even
keep what we have today in good repair, I don't know what hope there is to
do so if we add a bunch of new stuff.

Again, curious what others think.

On Wed, Apr 7, 2021 at 5:42 AM Andrew Russell <andy at themaintainers.org>
wrote:

> Hi -
>
> Another “ripped from the headlines” post :)
>
> This one from Robert Reich, framing President Biden as Mr. Fix It:
> https://www.commondreams.org/views/2021/04/05/joe-biden-mr-fix-it
>
> Andy
>
>
> _____
>
> Andrew L. Russell, Ph.D.
> + Dean, College of Arts & Sciences, SUNY Polytechnic Institute
> + Co-Director, The Maintainers <https://themaintainers.org/>
> + Co-Author, The Innovation Delusion: How Our Obsession with the New Has
> Disrupted the Work That Matters Most
> <https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/576816/the-innovation-delusion-by-lee-vinsel-and-andrew-l-russell/>
>
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-- 
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http://davidralbrecht.com/

weniger, aber besser
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