Posted on 06/16/2017 5:52:41 AM PDT by Tolerance Sucks Rocks
NEW YORK (CNNMoney) -- President Trump says he's creating a $1 trillion plan to rebuild America's roads, bridges and runways.
"We will create the first class infrastructure our country and our people deserve," Trump said Wednesday in Cincinnati. "It's time to rebuild our country to bring back our jobs."
Trump has dubbed this week as "infrastructure week."
But an analysis of the Trump budget finds that it cuts infrastructure spending overall by $55 billion, according to the University of Pennsylvania's Wharton Budget Model, a non-partisan research organization. (Coincidentally, Trump graduated from the Wharton School in 1968).
Over 10 years, Trump's budget does allocate $200 billion of federal money for infrastructure spending. But it also cuts $255 billion in existing infrastructure programs which it calls wasteful, including grants for highway renovation, Native American water facilities and rural airports.
The White House's Office of Management and Budget contests the UPenn tally of the budget. It says the cuts proposed for one year can't be assumed to be the same for 10 years.
Kimberly Burham, managing director at the Penn Wharton Budget Model, says such assumptions are reasonable and common when conducting a budget analysis, even if they aren't ideal.
The White House OMB says some cuts are for programs in which not all the funds go to infrastructure. It further adds that major cuts in UPenn's tally aren't considered cuts by the administration but are programs it won't be renewing once they run out of their current funds.
But Trump isn't convincing many that his infrastructure plan will become law anytime soon.
The Office of Economic Cooperation and Development cut its forecast for U.S. growth on Wednesday, citing the slow pace of Trump's economic reforms.
(Excerpt) Read more at abc-7.com ...
no money? tell where the humongous amount of money we pay for gasoline taxes goes? Is it being spirited away into general revenues as they have done with our social security contributions?
Infrastructure is a good investment, assuming it’s on budget and on schedule.
Ho-hum...
Another garbage “study” that uses biased assumptions to “prove” a pre-ordained result.
That “study” did NOT factor in the benefits to our economy that will result when the government stops making “research grants” for nonsense.
President Trump thinks outside the box. He will get $1 worth out of every dollar remaining in the budget, instead of 50 cents worth as happens nowadays, AND he will leverage private funds in addition.
He may have to depend on experts in other areas, but when he talking development, he’s one of the foremost experts in the world.
We already have a long standing infrastructure promise - the federal excise tax on gas and diesel.
Trump should be making sure those funds are being used properly before piling on.
Capturing this runaway debt and creeping toward a balanced budget has to be a priority over roads.
“But an analysis of the Trump budget finds that it cuts infrastructure spending overall by $55 billion...”
Well, he IS used to bringing in projects under budget and on time, so that’s THAT. ;)
I don’t believe Trump intends for the government to just put up a trillion dollars for infrastructure. The MSM conflates a trillion dollar infrastructure initiative with the government spending a trillion dollars. They can’t see past the government being the wellspring of everything. Government is their god.
How many billions of dollars of infrastructure incentive can be generated by cutting red tape and making regulation sensible?
I suspect he will be most of the way to 1 trillion dollars without spending a penny of tax dollars.
Just triple the taxes on CNN Money and ABC. What are they greedy or something and wouldn’t want to fulfill their socialist credo? They should be happy to pay out of the ying-yang to cover this.
Infrastructure is a good thing, but government spending on infrastructure is still government spending - something we need far less of.
The only way to put a conservative spin on government spending on infrastructure, is to point to taxpayer money spent on foriegn aid, endowment for the arts or climate change, and say the money would be BETTER spent on infrastructure.
In other words, if Trump redirects money now spent on liberal BS toward infrastructure, I’m fine with that.
If he fails to free up enough to keep his infrastructure promise - I’m fine with that.
If he finds some creative ways to fund infrastructure, like privitization, I’m super fine with that.
Taxpayer tunded infrastructure spending is one promise Trump can break as far as I’m concerned.
It’s a leftist concept.
Close down some of the useless duplicate departments.
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