“By the way,” said Donald Trump on Tuesday, we need to borrow at least half a trillion dollars for infrastructure projects. The proposal was made in a telephone interview on Fox Business.
It is not clear that Mr. Trump has thought the matter through; borrowing and spending for infrastructure is not one of the items in the “positions” section of his campaign website. But in the interview, he told Stuart Varney that Hillary Clinton’s “numbers are a fraction of what we’re talking about.” How much was he saying we should spend on infrastructure? “I would say at least double her numbers, and you're going to really need more than that.”
Click here to read more Blade editorials
Mrs. Clinton’s proposal is $275 billion; double that is $550 billion. Mr. Varney mentioned $800 billion or $1 trillion, and Mr. Trump did not object.
The money, Mr. Trump said, would come from selling bonds. “People would put money into the fund,” he said. “The citizens would put money into the fund.” It would go to infrastructure construction and, apparently, repair. “We have bridges that are falling down,” he said.
Currently, the federal debt held by “the public” — which includes the Chinese government — is about $14 trillion; $550 billion would be a 3.5 percent increase, or $1,697.53 in additional debt for every man, woman, and child in the country.
Many traditionalists in the party Mr. Trump now leads will be appalled at this proposal. Republicans have, historically, been the party of fiscal conservatism. Many in Mr. Trump’s core constituency will embrace it as a way to rebuild forgotten swaths (small towns as well as great cities) of the industrial Midwest. Still others will hail Mr. Trump’s boldness. But one thing is for sure, this idea — like his ideas on detente with Russia and a defense tax for NATO allies — is at least as worth debating as Mr. Trump’s latest gaffe or his personality quirks.
If Mr. Trump and Hillary Clinton were to engage in a back and forth about rebuilding the nation’s infrastructure and how to pay for it, the country would be the beneficiary.
First Published August 6, 2016, 4:00 a.m.
