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发帖数: 1 | 1 Infrastructure bill's boost to economy is likely to be limited
The bipartisan infrastructure bill is unlikely to have a big impact on
growth in the next few years, economists say. Longer term, though,
investments in highways, ports and broadband could make the economy more
efficient and productive.
The short-term boost to growth will be relatively limited for two reasons,
economists say. For one, the bill represents just $550 billion in new
spending—compared with nearly $6 trillion that Congress has approved in the
past year-and-a-half to battle the Covid-19 pandemic and its economic
fallout.
Second, the infrastructure spending will take place over five to 10 years
starting in 2022, a longer timeline than pandemic-era initiatives like
stimulus checks, extra unemployment benefits and small-business support
programs. That will make its direct effects on employment and demand less
noticeable.
Alec Phillips, chief political economist for Goldman Sachs Research, said
the infrastructure bill could add around 0.2 percentage point to gross
domestic product growth next year, and 0.3 percentage point in 2023.
By comparison, President Biden’s $1.9 trillion American Rescue Plan, passed
by Congress in March, is projected to lift government outlays by the
equivalent of 4.9% of GDP in the current fiscal year, according to the
Congressional Budget Office.
To be sure, the impact of that and other more-immediate stimulus is starting
to fade as pandemic-relief programs expire, such as a $300 increase to
weekly unemployment payments set to expire in September. Extra spending on
infrastructure could lighten the drag as overall government spending
declines.
The CBO expects economic growth to slow from 7.4% in 2021, a year of rapid
post-Covid recovery, to 3.1% in 2022 and 1.1% in 2023, as measured from the
end of the fourth quarter to the same period the year before. The
projections don’t include possible effects of the infrastructure bill. |
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