Infrastucture bank is not an evil plot by Hillary

The WaPo writer said it was!!!!

Well, actually, the WaPo conflated HRC's non-rolled out policy initiative with that of a initiative that the (President) Obama Administration was supportive of ... and DU did the rest.

Hillary's would not.

So Bernie's is better.

And public private 'partnerships' AKA privatization.

Perhaps YOU should read it!

https://www.americanprogress.org/wp-content/uploads/2012/09/InfrastructureBankReport.pdf

The majority of proposals permit an infrastructure bank to offer long-term loans and loan guarantees of up to about 35 years, with the potential for flexible repayment schedules that would allow investors the time required to complete large-scale projects and begin recouping their costs via user fees, tolls, or other revenue sources. Entities eligible to receive financing would include state and local governments, private investors, or public-private partnerships. Eligible project areas vary somewhat between the plans but would almost certainly include energy, transportation, and water projects, possibly alongside environmental and telecommunications undertakings.

AKA neoliberalism, AKA fascism.

For that I give you kudos.

Works Progress Administration

... opposed their OWN BILL after President Obama indicated that he also supported it. No matter how benign or routine or sensible or nondescript the policy is, no matter if their own candidate also supports it, it suddenly becomes an anathema if Hillary supports it.

"Blah blah third way, something something oligarchy, yadda yadda one percent, something else about landlines and focus groups for good measure."

Though I'd argue with the characterization as "evil".

The goal is to extract much higher interest for private investment.

Politicians can pretend they are not raising taxes in the short run, but those interest payments will have to come from somewhere.

Instead, we should do it "the old fashioned way" and just raise taxes. After all, the federal gas tax hasn't gone up since 1993, despite the fact that we have had inflation since 1993.

The interest is paid by the borrower. It is income to the Federal Treasury.

The Federal Treasury is not the only lender. In fact, under the proposed plan the government is the lender for about 5% of the funds.

The vast majority of the money comes from "private investment".

That's what "Leverage billions in additional private investment" in your OP means.

It's pretty obvious. It calls for privatization, but calls it 'public private partnerships'. Neoliberalism.

I'm a Berniac, by the way.

The proposal for an infrastructure bank to fund projects that would pay for themselves through a steam of toll revenues is, so far as that goes, a good idea that ought to be implemented. It creates several kinds of benefits. The toll revenues would pay the bonds -- first claim -- and any surplus should then revert to the government.

The provision of road services for free is not a particularly progressive position. We should advocate efficient pricing of road services, and a zero price for road services is not efficient, especially if the roads are congested. Historically, roads have mostly been free because it costs a great deal to build toll plazas and staff them. (A bridge from Washington to Oregon was made free because the toll-collection lost money, if I am not mistaken.) With 21st century electronic technology -- EZPass (R), cellphones, satellite positioning -- there is no reason we should not each pay the cost of the roads we use.

The cost would not fall disproportionately on the poor, because the poor are more likely to use public transportation. People in chauffered cars probably would not pay their fair share, but the way to correct that is by means of a wealth tax.

There is a proposal on the right to establish toll authorities to manage these tolls, and auction them to be collected and managed by private firms -- a form of privatization. This must be prevented. The toll collection should be managed by government or by government-established nonprofits -- "quangos" -- with the clear mission of efficient, not profit-seeking, pricing. As Joe Stiglitz observes, a big part of the inequality in our society has been created by government giving away profitable assets to private sector "entrepreneurs." That is the danger we face here, and any proposal for an infrastructure bank should make it clear that the private sector will be kept out of the public patrimony that are our roads and highways. A public-private partnership means the government picks your pocket and the private sector banks the proceeds.

The way to prevent that is to back a progressive program for efficiently priced roads in public ownership, not to dismiss any pricing as nasty right-wing subterfuge.

The "Center for American Progress" does seem to take progressive positions as a whole, but it does also mention "public-private partnerships" that "offer shareholders a direct stake in projects." This is not perhaps evil, but is very stupid and in practice antiprogressive. It is this sort of stupidity that progressives ought to oppose, even -- no, especially -- when it comes from people we could agree with on many other matters.

Someone lives in a major city, and thinks everywhere else behaves the same.

Btw, here's how this works out in real life:
The "public-private partnership" forms a new corporation to build the toll road. The government guarantees the bonds, but they're supposed to be paid by tolls, so win-win! In return for their efforts, the corporation is granted a long-term right to collect those tolls. After all, the bonds have to be paid, right?

Then after the road is built, the corporation declares bankruptcy and dissolves. The toll collection rights are sold to another company as part of the bankruptcy. And then the government gets to make the bond payments, since they guaranteed the bonds. While not getting toll money.

This scam has been pulled many times in many states. We really do not need to nationalize it.

The danger I made explicit reference to was exactly that. As I said, public-private partnership means that the government picks your pocket and the private sector pockets the proceeds. It would be nice if you read what I wrote, instead of just the headline.

Sid

That being said, toll roads suck. This is our only possible future? Getting nickle and dimed to death on every fucking road I drive for all eternity? Private sector has carte blanche to raise prices all they want with the excuse "need to cover cost". Not to mention I continue to pay gas taxes and now I will pay for the privilege to drive to work or school everyday.
Again, the .08% get more rich with every passing day (as of 2014, .08% of wage earners in America earned 53% of the total value all wages in America) while more and more of my very limited income, as do many like me, goes to the the basic concept of "paying to just exist". Anyone that thinks this is a great plan can go fuck themselves.

At some point people like me will have no more to give. Without dramatic changes in the near future, just like climate change, it is not a matter of "if" but "when".

I found 1/2 hour yesterday to print out and read it. (I'm old: I'm still more comfortable reading from paper. Besides I can rack back.) The policy paper is about much more than roads, but it is in the case of roads that the generation of revenue to repay bonds is mainly an issue.

However "progressive" I do think that the paper is ambiguous on the privatization of infrastructure. "Public-private partnership" is a nice way of saying "crony capitalism." Both Hillary and Bernie have supported an infrastructure bank. If there are differences in their positions, it will be on this point. I haven't investigated that.