Do we really want to be penny-wise but pound-foolish with our infrastructure?
Tim Rowland  Columnist  We know the axiom about the making of law and sausage, so perhaps it should be no surprise that doing the wrong thing in a bipartisan way is hailed as a greater achievement than doing the right thing with no opposition buy-in. A dollar doesnt go as far as it used to, so maybe early complaints that a bipartisan infrastructure proposal only calls for $587 billion in new spending is just a sign of the times. But such a sum is still weighty enough that it is a tacit admission of something else: We have done a rotten job of keeping up with what should be the basic daily functions of government for going on half a century now, and the bills are coming due. Some highway engineers say you are safer on a bridge built under the Eisenhower administration than one built 30 years later under the Reagan administration. In the 1980s, governments were so caught up in the religious ecstasy of tax cuts that cheap construction was emphasized over quality construction. A bridge in the 20th century was expected to have a 50-year lifespan. Yet many bridges built in the 1950s are still hanging in there after 70 years, while the ones built in the 1980s are wearing out after 40. So congratulations to the tax hawks. Saving millions of dollars 40 years ago is costing taxpayers billions of dollars today. The infrastructure tussle is also touching off a somewhat amusing debate over the definition of infrastructure itself. In a way, everything is infrastructure, because everything that is built in some way supports the American whole. But in general, most people would consider roads, bridges, the electrical grid and now broadband to be what is basically understood as fitting the definition. It is instructive to note that no one is arguing that some of Americas nursing homes are not a mess. Cheaply warehousing our elderly poor, who are provided with a cold hot dog and a shot of dope for lunch, is seen as a for-profit ideal, in a way that would embarrass the average ogre in a Charles Dickens novel. Instead, the argument against funding nursing homes is that they are not technically infrastructure. That contention is simultaneously plausible and shameful. COVID-19 shone a bright light on the industry. In one rural nursing home owned by a New York City conglomerate, a new battery of employees was bused in from Louisiana (the positions do not pay enough to attract local workers, who can make more money washing dishes in a resort hotel) and put in place without proper PPE or even a COVID test, which would have represented an added expense. Before the summer was over, 16 people had died. But the company had saved the price of a round of facemasks. Nursing homes were lumped into infrastructure because of the discouraging reality that legislation targeted specifically to nursing home reform would stand no chance in a Senate whose minoritys stated goal is to block 100% of the current administrations agenda  the litmus test is not whether the legislation is good or bad, it fails solely because it was proposed by someone from the opposing party. Some of this is grandstanding, but some of it is not. Next time youre stuck in traffic, or in an airport or your electricity flickers or you have no internet service, you should thank Grover Norquist, who since 1986 has made Republicans swear an oath against any and all efforts to increase taxes  money that would have been spent on transportation, the energy grid or a new generation of technology. You can take a pledge never to change the oil in your car, and you will save money for a while. But Norquist will cost you far more money and aggravation in the long run than he saves you; fortunately for him, most people cant see past the end of next week. Even so, President Bidens full infrastructure plan could be paid for as we go without raising taxes, but just by getting people to pay what they legally owe. But thats not allowed either. The machinery of tax collection has been defunded as well, to the point that, former treasury officials say, a dirt farmer in the Deep South has a better chance of being audited than a member of the 1%  who, we learned last week, often pay nothing at all. Leona Helmsley, whose worth at her death was $4 billion, famously said, "We don't pay taxes; only the little people pay taxes." Little did we know she was speaking for all her fellow billionaires and half of Congress as well. No wonder we cant even patch a pothole. Tim Rowland is a Herald-Mail columnist.