Does spending on infrastructure create other kinds of jobs in the economy ?

Does spending on infrastructure create other kinds of jobs in the economy because the workers have jobs and have paychecks to spend in the economy if the workers buy cars with their paychecks auto workers are hired ? Has this ideas ever been refuted ? Do both Democrats and Republicans agree that infrastructure spending can help the economy ? Since infrastructure jobs are temporary would they then get other jobs they will have paychecks to spend ? Also did FDR ever say spending on infrastructure would create jobs ? Do infrastructure jobs kill jobs in the private sector ?

Then all of those workers have paychecks that they can spend on groceries, clothing, furniture, cars, houses, utilities, entertainment, appliances, restaurants, vacations, and all sorts of things. That creates demand in those industries. And that creates jobs. If those companies have enough work, they can spend some of their revenue to hire more employees or to upgrade their own facilities. See, more demand, more jobs. And government gets its new stuff built and its old stuff fixed. See. Everybody wins.

patomalley.wordpress.com... ... e-economy/

This fallacy continues to circulate. Doesn't the current state of the world economy show you that the Keynesian economic philosophy is an epic failure?

That works as long as the infrastructure spending is perpetual and widespread.

The eventual cost of the government borrowing all that money will screw us over in the long run.

As is happening now. In case you havent noticed.

There arent many institutions left for the government to hide it's worthless currency. Nobody wants the debt. Which is why this most recent bursting of the bubble is global.

If everyone is a government employee, basically what you are advocating, who pays the salaries?

The state would have to engage in blatant war and plunder to fund it's existence on a scale too great to hide or sugar-coat as it does now.

Spending on infrastructure, while it has its positives, also rewards the exact same people who write the largest percentage of checks to support politicians running for office from the local level on up. It feeds the political contributors in direct proportion to their contributions.

I would say that it works better than bailing out banks or keeping up wars. As for those that argue Keynesian economics obviously doesn't work, it wasn't Keynesian that got us into this mess. It was the idiotic deregulation, trickle-down economics that sent everything to Hades.

reply to post by AnIntellectualRedneck


It was partial deregulation. The perfect mix of pseudo free markets and just enough government involvement to pave the way for rampant corruption, manipulation and exploitation.

An oligopoly.

The added bonus is people believe it was true deregulation and demand government step up and take more power and control which only increases the totality of the oligopoly merging total corporate interest with the authority, guns and jails of the government.

And because the people cant seem to differentiate between true deregulation and partial deregulation they actually ask and beg en masse for this to happen.

the Unsustainable Costs of Partial Deregulation starts to explain this better than I can.

reply to post by mikejohnson2006


It does work and gives tangible worthwhile and useable physical results. However it is not a cure-all, it is a temporary boost to increase economic activity. As it stands now in the economy we have now the effects of such spending are highly diluted. Outside of paying your mortgage and other domestic bills, the bulk of that will end up going to corporations that then invest that money overseas. For it to have a massively stimulative effect relies solely on those involved in these projects to actually pay more and shop at local merchants on products created here as opposed to the national retail outlets and products created overseas. Which isn't going to happen. Americans want easy solutions and there are none.

The big box stores in large part have decimated local merchants, but they only have half the blame. The consumers who made them successful have the other half. To come out of this consumers have to be educated about the products they are buying and how it effects those around them. Not just how it effects their pocket. People like to rail about corporate greed, and to an extent they are right but they have encouraged it and allowed it. The labor movement didn't succeed on just the workers, it succeeded because they got many of the consumers to agree with and support them.

Until people are willing to not buy a TV and other household goods things will continue as they have been. In the end you can do infrastructure spending until the nation goes broke, it will continue to have limited effect and things will continue as they have. Or you can educate yourself and stop buying the things you do not really have to have until such a time it is manufactured here. The biggest cause of this is the consumer and the only ones that can really change that are the consumers.

Originally posted by thisguyrighthere
That works as long as the infrastructure spending is perpetual and widespread.

Long term...infrastructure allows for shorter commutes, less traffic, increased businesses moving to the area, more tourism and trade shows, easier job mobility, less fuel costs to employees, easier tele-commuting, better education etc. etc. Infrastrusture improvements are not a just a short-term stimulas...there is a reason that every other country on earth is heavily developing infrastructure...because they don't have idealogues running their government...and thier is a reason the USA, who was once #1 in the world when it came to infrastructure has now dropped down the rankings dramatically with bad roads and crumbling bridges...because we have idealogues running our government.

Not everything is a left/right thing or a culture war...infrastructure is critical to a nation or cities success.