America does invest into itself. But Americans generally don't want the investment.
* No one likes welfare. At best, Americans begrudgingly accept it when necessary, but many people (even poor people) refuse to accept it at all.
* Investments into Education are fraught with political issues. Spend $1 billion bucks on a new Math program and everyone loses their collective minds. Buy a new teacher and people think you're indoctrinating them with Critical Race Theory.
* Improve local land, and the leftists yell "Gentrification". Oh, I'm sorry I wanted to improve this area with parks and metro stations and bus stops. Yes, that increases rent prices in the area but what else did you expect to happen?
* Try to build low-income houses elsewhere and people stonewall you with NIMBYism. People don't like their property values declining, which happens when low-cost housing is made.
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At some point, its just not worth the political hassle. Americans largely don't want the money or things to change. It doesn't matter if they're right-wing or left-wing, changing cities for the better is change and scary.
> America does invest into itself. But Americans generally don't want the investment.
This is far from the case. Case in point: nearly 3 trillion and counting in public stimulus over the last couple of years. In fact, even the Republicans are mostly on board with many items from Biden's infrastructure bill, which is in the 2-3 trillion range.
> * No one likes welfare. At best, Americans begrudgingly accept it when necessary, but many people (even poor people) refuse to accept it at all.
This is something that is inherent in American culture, perhaps a bit more so than European countries. Americans as a group believe in 'pulling yourself by the bootstraps', more than any other group. However, support for investment into America is there. The proof is the massive stimulus bills that have passed, despite > 20 trillion of federal debt.
> This is far from the case. Case in point: nearly 3 trillion and counting in public stimulus over the last couple of years. In fact, even the Republicans are mostly on board with many items from Biden's infrastructure bill, which is in the 2-3 trillion range.
Lets think about how this would play out.
Money will come down from on-high at the Federal level. States will analyze their road systems, and decide "This traffic light should be converted into an overpass, causing 20% reduction in traffic in this area" (or something similar).
And what will happen with the local population? They'll go nuts. Some rightfully so (any such large infrastructure project would cause some houses to be displaced, to make room for the overpass). Others will care about gentrification and rising home prices. Still others will worry about debts and budgets.
That's what I mean. You'll have to force the infrastructure down people's throats if you actually want it to get done.
* No one likes welfare. At best, Americans begrudgingly accept it when necessary, but many people (even poor people) refuse to accept it at all.
* Investments into Education are fraught with political issues. Spend $1 billion bucks on a new Math program and everyone loses their collective minds. Buy a new teacher and people think you're indoctrinating them with Critical Race Theory.
* Improve local land, and the leftists yell "Gentrification". Oh, I'm sorry I wanted to improve this area with parks and metro stations and bus stops. Yes, that increases rent prices in the area but what else did you expect to happen?
* Try to build low-income houses elsewhere and people stonewall you with NIMBYism. People don't like their property values declining, which happens when low-cost housing is made.
-----
At some point, its just not worth the political hassle. Americans largely don't want the money or things to change. It doesn't matter if they're right-wing or left-wing, changing cities for the better is change and scary.