The issue is aging infrastructure in rural America. There is no disagreement that it needs rebuilding. The federal government is talking big with a $1.5 trillion plan. Only 13% of the money will come from the Feds. It may be the rural equivalent of who?s going to pay for the border wall/ Except this time, the answer may be farmers, businesses and state governments.
Five cabinet secretaries, insisted before the Senate Commerce Committee, that there are ways to pay for the president?s $1.5 trillion infrastructure plan which tries to leverage most of the sum with 13% in federal funds. Among administration ideas ? public-private partnerships with some resulting in toll roads, bonds, the unspoken gas tax hike and even the sale of public lands and facilities.
Representative Tammy Duckworth (D-IL) and United States Secretary of Commerce Wilbur Ross exchange ideas on funding the federal share, in the program below.
AUDIO: Agribusiness Matters 3-15-18
