President Biden laid out the framework for the American Jobs Plan, a $2.25 trillion infrastructure proposal, at the end of March. Whatever else can be said about it, the plan is breathtakingly expansive and expensive—yet represents, as the president put it, “a once-in-a generation investment in America.” The proposal put forth an almost incomprehensible scale of spending— it has already been decried as too large by conservatives and too small by Green New Deal proponents— but is envisioned as igniting the American economy, not only by financing conventional infrastructure such as bridges and tunnels, but also in renewing and expanding affordable-housing stock and public education facilities, and funding green technology. Biden, acknowledging it is big and bold, said, “We can get it done.”
How it gets done, when it gets done, and at what ultimate price tag, remain the trillion dollar questions. The biggest slice of the proposal’s pie goes to infrastructure repair, with $621 billion (roughly 28 percent of the plan) allocated to transportation-related projects. While that may seem like a lot of roadwork—and $25 billion of that is set aside for airports—the plan also includes equitable remediation strategies, such as $20 billion to “reconnect neighborhoods cut off by historic investments [read urban renewal and highways that cut through cities] and ensure new projects increase opportunity, advance racial equity and environmental justice, and promote affordable access.”
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