Human capital and infrastructure Book

Assessing an economy's infrastructure is like examining one's health: it is of concern only when something goes wrong. Residents of Ontario and Quebec, for example, did not bother themselves much with their electric power grid until the 1998 ice storm flattened it. This collection of essays seeks to interest policymakers in infrastructure policy, writ large, without the spur of a crisis, since certain general purpose assets - physical facilities such as roads, railroads, seaports, and airports, and intangible human capital - are necessary for sustained economic development. Infrastructure policy is important, but complex and hard to get right. Infrastructure investments in different sectors of the economy require different things. Some need public money, some need effective public management, and others need less public management and greater reliance on market mechanisms. Over the past generation, it has become normal for politicians, journalists, and the general public to pose questions about appropriate monetary policy. A more mature discussion similarly needs to take place with respect to infrastructure policy. The public should expect governments to report the results of cost-benefit analysis launching major projects. Journalists and politicians should understand the logic of these techniques sufficiently to pose meaningful questions about net present values, discount rates, and other such concepts. About the Author: Aidan R. Vining is the CNABS Professor of Business and Government Relations in the Faculty of Business Administration, Simon Fraser University, and Co-Director of the SFU-UBC Centre for the Study of Government and Business. John Richards is Phillips Scholar in Social Policy and Fellow-in-Residence at the C.D. Howe Institute. He is also a professor at Simon Fraser University.