Historian Walter Licht – President Biden’s big plans through the lens of history. The American Jobs Plan and how it compares to national projects of the past

President Biden introduced a $2 trillion plan last month to rebuild America’s infrastructure and reshape the economy in the wake of the pandemic.

He called it a “once in a generation investment in America,” leading to comparisons with Franklin Roosevelt over the ambitious scale of Biden’s agenda.

As Biden marks his 100th day in office, Penn Today asked historian Walter Licht for his take on the sweeping American Jobs Plan, how it compares to infrastructure projects of the past, and the aptness of the comparison to the 32nd president.

 

Relief, recovery, or infrastructure?

Glancing at the measures put forth in FDR’s New Deal, many appear to be infrastructure measures but in fact they are relief and recovery projects, Licht says, and that’s an important distinction.

“When public works building projects were launched in the 1930s, the language of rationale was about putting unemployed people back to work, not primarily about payoffs in 20-30 years,” he says. “It is not that such relief and recovery measures did not have long-term impacts, but the goal of pure infrastructure projects aim at the far future; something Biden’s plan seems to do to a greater extent than in the case of FDR.”

 

The long view

Ever since the establishment of settled societies, going back 5,000 years, governments have been active in infrastructure development, he says. In ancient Mesopotamia, potentates applied tax revenue to create navigable riverways. From ancient canal systems to the Appian Way to the complicated water viaduct systems that were built during the Roman Empire, infrastructure creation was a large part of creating ancient societies, Licht says.

It is also important to distinguish three levels of governments involved in infrastructure development in the United States, he says, because municipal authorities in such emerging urban centers as Philadelphia were very active in infrastructure projects, even in colonial times. State governments were equally promotive throughout the 19th century.

Looking at Philadelphia in the 19th century, for example, there’s an incredible amount of activity not driven by relief or recovery concerns during periods of economic crisis but by creating infrastructure for future benefit, according to Licht.

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