One area where government could be spending and isn’t

by pdxblake

One of the most depressed sectors of the economy for the past few years is construction, and so, you might suppose that the government would use the people sitting out of work for public spending projects to stimulate the economy (while doing needed construction work now that costs are likely to be low).   Alas, that is not how things are done because, well, “socialism!” (or something, I’m not sure what passes for reasons for Congress not to pass infrastructure spending bills, like the stuff in Obama’s American JOBS Act).

Anyway, without further ado, here’s the trajectory of construction spending over the past 2 decades.

Source: Calculated Risk blog