If there is anything that we have learned from analysis, thought, and observation, it is that we also need to increase public investment in workforce skills, in staying in the forefront of technology, and in having a modern, effective infrastructure. There has been a lot of controversy among economists, most of it fairly esoteric, about how you measure the contributions of infrastructure to productivity and economic growth. There have been some wild claims that make it sound as though just fixing the roads and bridges is all we need to do to get the economy moving again. Obviously, there is a connection between ability to move people, goods, and ideas around and the productivity of an economy. We can have a highly skilled workforce and be on the cutting edge of technology, but if it takes too long and costs too much to move the product and the people and the ideas, it is not going to be the kind of productive economy that we need.
Infrastructure is a big piece of our economy.
Transportation, also, is around 15 percent of our gross domestic product. Furthermore, we drive and move an incredible 3.5 trillion passenger miles. Because of the size of these numbers, any significant improvement in infrastructure productivity has the potential to enhance economic growth. The President's plan recognizes this link and calls for significant increases in federal infrastructure spending, particularly for transportation and environmental infrastructure. Budgeting We have gotten a substantial part of the infrastructure investment that the administration requested for Fiscal Year 1994.