...(is it better to employ 1000 new 100k a year engineers, or 5000 new skilled and unskilled trade workers?)
I'm of the mind that the more people that can benefit, the better. So in your example
RB, 5000 new jobs would be better than 1000 IMHO.
...and I agree that the U.S. is behind Japan and Europe in high-speed rail and I also agree that private industry could never come up with that kinda dough to fund the projects.
Rick, I had several more questions in that post, you picked the easiest and, even though I said there were no 'rhetorical' questions, I kind of expect most would see the 5000 jobs as being better than 1000.
What I'd really like to know is, what answers do you or anyone else have to the other questions? Particularly, will truly "shovel-ready" projects do more to stimulate the domestic economy, given that, in many cases, construction funds may go to purchase foreign materiel, equipment, etc. That may be good for the world and indirectly for us, but would you be more pleased with a shovel-ready project where 50% of the funds went to China and Japan, compared to an "engineering studies" project phase where 50% of the funds went to project engineer wages and 50% went to local communities to purchase land and right-of-way.
Just as an example.
By the way, kudos to you for actually considering that a national benefit is more reasonable than for just your own state... if only more congresscritters thought that way!
