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September 1988, No. 13

A six-car collision on Tampa's two-lane Howard Frankland Bridge—the locals call it the "Frankenstein"—causes a three-hour traffic jam during rush hour. A dam bursts near Toccoa, Georgia, killing thirty-nine residents—mostly children—of a tiny Bible college. A bridge collapses on Interstate 95 in Connecticut, hurling six people into the river some 75 feet below, killing three and injuring several others.

Last Updated: 09/29/1988

Rx for Productivity: Build Infrastructure

David Alan Aschauer

Accidents and disasters happen almost daily in the United States. They are outward signs of a growing affliction—the decay of our national infrastructure. But not only safety and convenience are affected. There are deeper implications of this national neglect for the health of the U.S. economy. Indeed, as Bill Clinton, Governor of Arkansas, recently wrote, "America is falling apart, literally. Federal budget pressures and changes in the Federal tax law in the 1980s have steepened a decline in public works spending that dates to the 1950s."