Obama's Public Works: Will it Work?

There has been some talk recently about Barack Obama’s decision to spend billions of dollars on public works projects to create new jobs and keep up our infrastructure. He has suggested a massive overhaul of the interstate highway system, focused on bridges, but has also mentioned the ‘greening’ of buildings and making high speed internet available in more places. Obama seems to be taking a page out of the book of FDR and Eisenhower for this idea, but I just have trouble seeing these public works projects being extremely effective in helping the economy. It is true that billions of dollars will be spent in order to create these new jobs and make these changes, but the problem is that the plan risks having little to no effect on the economy, all the while sinking the U.S. into greater and greater debt.

While I do not plan to discuss Obama’s tax plans, I will bring up the point that there are many other projects that are in need of government funding as well. Energy is one that comes to mind immediately, as does education. Hopefully, Obama’s plans to institute these public works projects will not adversely affect other government entities and cause jobs to be lost there. As one of my previous posts mentioned, I am just slightly afraid that Obama’s spending will be digging government into too deep of a hole; even deeper than the hole it is already in thanks to George Bush.

While projects such as these may have worked in the past, I’m just not sure that they will have the same effect as they have previously. Obama has mentioned ideas such as ‘greening’ buildings and making high-speed internet more available, but these simply do not seem like the best choices for spending given the current economic situation. The people will be getting much less benefit out of these projects as when compared to the projects of the 1950s, which resulted in the creation of our massive interstate highway system.

Overall, I just think something may have to give. If Obama throws so much money at these public works projects; there will probably have to be cuts to other government programs that would result in the negation of any jobs created by the works projects. Or if Obama does not make cuts to other areas, I’m simply worried he may be either overtaxing the people, or putting the government way too far into debt in this time of economic crisis.


http://www.nytimes.com/2008/12/07/us/politics/07radio.html?ref=us