Infrastructure

Infrastructure has become a hotly contested concept in recent years. While some still hold to the 19th century notion that it refers only to transportation, and possibly to internet connection, the modern view is that it refers to all things the productive economy requires to be functional - health care, education, child care, vocational training, and access to employment by all racial and ethnic groups. The annual report on transportation by the American Society of Civil Engineers has given a grade of D+ or C-, and has done so for many years - to no effect. Expenditures on infrastructure are popular among mayors and governors, and with the public. Only Republicans in the Congress show reluctance to support funding, or funding for a modern understanding of what infrastructure currently means. Small airports and general service airports should receive funding along with rural roads and city streets. High speed rail is also popular, although it is everywhere subsidized by government. In the modern economy internet access is the essential element in any community's and individual's ability to compete.