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Imagine a future of broken bridges, roads, sewer systems, power grids, airports and not enough money to fix them or to build new ones to serve an expanding population. What would that cost the United States in terms of lost jobs?
A study released on Tuesday by the American Society of Civil Engineers says the cost in terms of lost jobs would be 3.5 million by 2020. It also projected a cumulative loss of $3.1 trillion in economic output over the same period without $1.1 trillion in additional funding for infrastructure projects.
"The results show that deteriorating infrastructure, long known to be a public safety issue, has a cascading impact on the nation's economy, negatively affecting business productivity, gross domestic product, employment, personal income and international competitiveness," the report entitled, "Failure to Act," said.
Source
There are very few Americans who will deny that the infrastructure in this country is decrepit and decaying. I truly believe one of the major obstacles in stabilizing unemployment is a general lack of infrastructure spending. But given the current (and likely future) political battle on budgets and taxes, the U.S. might be forced to take a back seat as other nations continue to lead the way in infrastructure and modernization initiatives.
Here are a few other sources relevant to the topic.
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