
All Roads Lead to Toll Roads: Robert Poole on America's Highways
Economics Detective Radio
Is There a Political Imperative to Lower Value Highway Projects?
A lower priority, lower value project wins out over a higher value one. Why do people build highways that aren't going to get used or aren't as high value as some other project? Right, well, this seems to be what appeals to politicians in a legislature to do. They love the idea of cutting ribbons in their district. If you imagine trying to run a cell phone operation on that kind of a piece, you would get cell towers where the politicians wanted them rather than where they were needed best for the most seamless and high quality service. I mean, this is just a system that is just not very well tuned to doing the job well.
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