On the other hand, I totally get the push for digitized school media and health records; I don't think it is possible to overestimate the cost savings from these efforts.
David Korten's Keynote Presentation Now Online
15 years ago
Monday, December 28, 2009
Infrastructure in the US
Looks like we are still trying to spend our way out of the recession (and now even I am saying enough is enough), but one very curious aspect of this plan has been the upgrade of our infrastructure. The phrase "shovel-ready" seems to point us at road and waste-water projects (disclaimer: I am very much a beneficiary of this political movement), but this article makes a very sensible request for smarter things. I just wonder how feasible a lot of it is. Remember the old broad-band over power line scheme that was supposed to change the world? I have to wonder if new nationalized infrastructure such as fiber trenches is technologically or economically wise.
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Interesting...
ReplyDeleteI don't know about whether the things mentioned in the article will in any way help us more than the shovel ready projects, but I am not a fan of any of this thinking - the author of the article wants to throw money at pet projects without dealing with the issues that have been blocking so many good ideas about infrastructure development. There is no difference between this and the other shovel ready projects.
ReplyDeleteI'm not sure how society really benefits from faster internet. The author can't imagine it. "It's hard even to imagine the types of applications possible in a 100 meg or gigabit per second speed world. The only one way to find out? Build it."
I can imagine it - Streaming a wide variety of high resolution 3D porn to your wrist watch. I think that for most people this falls in to the category of "want", not a societal need. This is faster access to bread and circus.
The author of the article almost had me on lightening backpacks until he said that his son has cans of red bull so he can pay attention to his droning teacher... I suspect that replacing the droning teachers with intelligent, competent and interesting educators would be a good start and might just take care of all the rest of the problems, given a generation or two.
Open questions: I will ignore the evil socialism involved in bailouts and stimulus funds and pretend for a moment that spending a trillion taxpayer dollars is ethical and proper. Pick anything you want - what is the best way to spend the money? What effect do you think your spending plans would have on society? Can a society be moved with the sophisticated application of 1 trillion dollars? How about a crude and ineffective application? How much money do you suppose it costs to effect real change for the entire US? What outcomes (quantifiable?) would make such high levels of investment worthwhile?
Good open question. Here I think it safest to point backwards instead of forwards, so some historical examples of where 1 trillion dollars or more were spent wisely and positively impacted (someone's) society:
ReplyDelete- WWI
- WWII
- Food stamps
- Medicaid/care
- The Space program
- Education loans/grants
But I hear what you are saying. I think, dollar for dollar, the most cost effective means of bettering society has shown to be through charity. Which is why I can't understand all the public resentment against forced-charity programs like welfare, unemployment, and food stamps.