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The US has forgotten how to do infrastructure

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Re: The US has forgotten how to do infrastructure

#111

Post by jimmyk »

Dirlewanger wrote: post #95
michaelt wrote: post #12

That suggests that U.S. costs are high due to general inefficiency [...] Americans have simply ponied up more and more cash over the years while ignoring the fact that they were getting less and less for their money. There's a general effect in political systems, that if a law takes $20 from 1,000,000 people and gives $100,000 to 200 people, the people who lose money won't have enough incentive to put up a big fight;…

>campaign finance reform, perhaps? Abso-fucking-lutely. I think in order to run at any levels of office, you should be using public money. For simplification, let's say if one wants to run for president, they can only use whatever is in the FEC public coffers. In return, we levy a federal FEC tax to boost it way higher than its current rates. We replicate a similar tax at state and local levels. Completely remove pri…

>For simplification, let's say if one wants to run for president, they can only use whatever is in the FEC public coffers.

What in particular would they not be allowed to use private money to do?

Would individuals that aren't running be allowed to use private money to do those things?

Re: The US has forgotten how to do infrastructure

#112

Post by solotronics »

mistermann wrote: post #81
Frondo wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wish the Libertarians who post this solution ("shrink the state to the bare minimum") would ever actually show us where it's working in practice, to provide a decent quality of life for people. In China, they're building mad infrastructure--big state. In Europe, they're providing a good quality of life--big state. The "small state" places I can think of, none of them are places people are flocking to for an improve…

Let's be honest, there are not that many examples to choose from. What I like about China is, it illustrates how effective a mostly benevolent dictatorship is. It is the optimal political system imho, provided it remains benevolent of course, which is no small feat. Provided they don't trip and fall, if China is not the absolute supreme leader of the planet in 25 - 50 years I will be shocked.

I just got back from China and the rate of infrastructure expansion is amazing. I have a theory that since they are highly centrally planned they don't really have to worry about if infrastructure is "profitable" in the Western sense of the term. They want to build roads and high speed trains? Well the government entirely controls the banks and construction companies so they just make some money and give it to the construction company, no concern for short term profit.

Re: The US has forgotten how to do infrastructure

#113

Post by bluGill »

imgabe wrote: post #80

I don't know the answers, but as someone who works in the industry (on the design side). I think a big unmentioned factor is probably liability and the prospect of litigation. If you look at old blueprints for projects in the past, they are a LOT less detailed. They had to be, because it was physically more difficult to produce them since they had to be drawn by hand. A lot was left to the contractor to figure out in…

A lot of contracts are design build though. One company bids to design and build the bridge. The cost overruns are back on them.

Re: The US has forgotten how to do infrastructure

#114

Post by abalashov »

rm_-rf_slash wrote: post #50
chadgeidel wrote: post #40

My brother and father (concrete construction) would probably lay the blame on onerous regulation. They regularly complain about nit-picky engineers with their insistence on (in their words) unreasonable slavish devotion to engineering specifications. I'm not on the jobsite so I don't actually know. I wonder is our construction regulations are much more stringent than other western nations?

Count your blessings. Construction can be much harder in other countries for reasons beyond engineering and safety. Italy, for example, is a real estate developers nightmare. Every rock or patch of dirt has a decent chance of sitting atop an Ancient Greek or Roman ruin, and the process to ensure that construction won't damage any heretofore unknown ruins is agonizingly slow. It boils down to political power and cultu…

> Americans are fine with tearing down almost anything (except designated landmarks) to build something "better" than before.

Unless that "anything" are super-expensive detached single-family homes on relatively large lots, and the proposed replacement is something that increases density. :-)

Oh, I'm obviously taking a pot shot at the Bay Area, but the influential underlying psychology exists to some extent everywhere else in the country, too. The vast majority of the country has zoning rules designed to prevent any expansion that isn't horizontal.

Re: The US has forgotten how to do infrastructure

#115

Post by saosebastiao »

blawson wrote: post #96
Frondo wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wish the Libertarians who post this solution ("shrink the state to the bare minimum") would ever actually show us where it's working in practice, to provide a decent quality of life for people. In China, they're building mad infrastructure--big state. In Europe, they're providing a good quality of life--big state. The "small state" places I can think of, none of them are places people are flocking to for an improve…

Not a libertarian, but Japan apparently has 16 private railway companies, most of which are profitable: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rail_transport_in_Japan#Major_...

That is a fairly natural outcome of having unsubsidized car and air travel.

It's really hard to claim libertarians believe uniformly in some things (they're wildly across the board on pretty much every issue), but most libertarians I know would cringe and fight back on higher gas taxes and airport fees.

Re: The US has forgotten how to do infrastructure

#116

Post by briandear »

mistermann wrote: post #81
Frondo wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wish the Libertarians who post this solution ("shrink the state to the bare minimum") would ever actually show us where it's working in practice, to provide a decent quality of life for people. In China, they're building mad infrastructure--big state. In Europe, they're providing a good quality of life--big state. The "small state" places I can think of, none of them are places people are flocking to for an improve…

Let's be honest, there are not that many examples to choose from. What I like about China is, it illustrates how effective a mostly benevolent dictatorship is. It is the optimal political system imho, provided it remains benevolent of course, which is no small feat. Provided they don't trip and fall, if China is not the absolute supreme leader of the planet in 25 - 50 years I will be shocked.

The dictionary defines benevolent as "well meaning and kindly."

And here are some counterexamples to the claim that the CCP is "well meaning and kindly" --

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tiananmen_Square_protests_of_1...

http://www.womensrightswithoutfrontiers.org/blog/chinese-gov...

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/political-prisoners-chin...

http://www.news.com.au/world/asia/extreme-torture-inside-chi...

http://thediplomat.com/2017/03/chinas-urbancide-in-tibet/

https://www.cfr.org/backgrounder/chinas-environmental-crisis

China's government is to "benevolence" as the Ministry of Love is to love. As far as "optimal political system" -- I'll simply disagree as we are all entitled to an opinion. However, the facts indicate that China is pretty much the opposite of "well meaning and kindly."

I lived there many years and love China -- but it certainly isn't because of the "benevolence" of the government.

The interesting thing is that nearly every one of the links I posted is blocked in China. I guess the government wouldn't want the people to find out just how "benevolent" they really are.

Re: The US has forgotten how to do infrastructure

#118

Post by madengr »

noonespecial wrote: post #51

I thought about this when I visited the Hoover Dam. The audacity of the thing and sheer impossibility of doing anything remotely like it in today's America makes it seem like a relic from an ancient civilization. It felt like visiting the pyramids in Egypt.

The development of the atomic bomb also amazes me. I get a kick out of this video setting up the first test:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J7CmcsOubZ8

No hard-hats

No shirts

Free climbing tower with no safety lines

Cigarette hanging from mouth

No way they could ever pull this off today. No way the Apollo program could be pulled off either.

Re: The US has forgotten how to do infrastructure

#119

Post by bluGill »

Dirlewanger wrote: post #95
michaelt wrote: post #12

That suggests that U.S. costs are high due to general inefficiency [...] Americans have simply ponied up more and more cash over the years while ignoring the fact that they were getting less and less for their money. There's a general effect in political systems, that if a law takes $20 from 1,000,000 people and gives $100,000 to 200 people, the people who lose money won't have enough incentive to put up a big fight;…

>campaign finance reform, perhaps? Abso-fucking-lutely. I think in order to run at any levels of office, you should be using public money. For simplification, let's say if one wants to run for president, they can only use whatever is in the FEC public coffers. In return, we levy a federal FEC tax to boost it way higher than its current rates. We replicate a similar tax at state and local levels. Completely remove pri…

I'm running for president, fund my trips around the country, and my ads on TV.

Nobody in their right mind would elect me, but I have yet to see a fair way to exclude me.

Re: The US has forgotten how to do infrastructure

#120

Post by Dirlewanger »

jimmyk wrote: post #111
Dirlewanger wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>campaign finance reform, perhaps? Abso-fucking-lutely. I think in order to run at any levels of office, you should be using public money. For simplification, let's say if one wants to run for president, they can only use whatever is in the FEC public coffers. In return, we levy a federal FEC tax to boost it way higher than its current rates. We replicate a similar tax at state and local levels. Completely remove pri…

>For simplification, let's say if one wants to run for president, they can only use whatever is in the FEC public coffers. What in particular would they not be allowed to use private money to do? Would individuals that aren't running be allowed to use private money to do those things?

I never really fleshed out the idea too much in my head. It may indeed be impossible to completely get rid of private money. With shit like super-PACs and all the different shell entities that exist solely to funnel money through, all those should be struck from the books. Private donations of $3500 or whatever the limit is? Sure, keep those.
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