The last thing America needs is a $1.2 trillion Washington infrastructure boondoggle, festooned with pork, waste and the usurpation of virtually every other institution’s proper function. That is, capital expenditures that properly are the business of the private sector, utilities, train passengers, airport users, motorists, state and local taxpayers and everyone else except the Federal government.
For instance, the bill contains $77 billion for renewing the electric power grid, including thousands of miles of new high efficiency transmission lines. But why can’t utilities and their rate payers handle those investments rather than future taxpayers who will have to service the Federal debt?
As it happens, annual constant dollar spending by major U.S. electric utilities on the power transmission system has increased from $9.1 billion (2019 dollars) in 2000 to $40.0 billion in 2019. That’s a not too shabby 8.1% annual growth rate – or approximately 4X the actual growth of real GDP during the period
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