Future Infrastructure budget cuts are inevitable – We must locate other means of investment to rebuild and innovate



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CP: Export-Import




Export-Import is organizationally is overburdened – only an external bank can solve


Scott Thomasson 2011, Economic and Domestic Policy Director Progressive Policy Institute

Testimony of Scott Thomasson Progressive Policy Institute October 12, 2011, United States House Of Representatives Committee On Transportation And Infrastructure: Hearing before the Subcommittee on Highways and Transit “National Infrastructure Bank: More Bureaucracy and Red Tape” October 12, 2011, http://republicans.transportation.house.gov/Media/file/TestimonyHighways/2011-10-12%20Thomasson.pdf

Myth #7: We don’t need a separate infrastructure bank, because we can simply expand

existing programs like TIFIA or the Export-Import Bank. Reality: Both TIFIA and the Export-Import (“Ex-Im”) Bank are well-run programs that are effective in achieving the specific missions they are charged with. There are structural similarities between AIFA and both TIFIA and Ex-Im that make the idea of transforming either program to act like an infrastructure bank very interesting on paper and perhaps worth exploring more. However, the organization and governance of the infrastructure bank would be materially different from TIFIA, and its mission and expertise would not necessarily be compatible with the Ex-Im Bank. TIFIA is already oversubscribed with only a handful of staff to process loan applications. Some people familiar with the workings of the TIFIA program believe it will not be able to handle the additional workload that will accompany recent proposals to “super-size” its budget authority. Throwing more money at the TIFIA program without an enhanced organizational structure will run the same risks of questionable underwriting decisions that the Solyndra critics allege of the DOE loan guarantee program.



An independent and professionally staffed infrastructure bank is the best response to the increasing need for expansion and better management of federal credit programs. A properly structured national bank achieves this first and foremost by replacing politically driven decision making with a more transparent and merit-based evaluation process overseen by a bipartisan and expert board of directors. This feature of the bank becomes even more important as the federal government moves toward financing larger, big-ticket projects that are beyond the scale of anything existing programs have taken on before. With respect to the idea that we can create an infrastructure bank within the Ex-Im Bank, we should be cautious about assuming we can re-task a well established bureaucracy with an entirely new mission that requires different financing expertise and a different institutional culture. It is probably better to avoid big changes to a program that is currently functioning well, and instead to look to it as a model to be drawn upon and replicated instead of forcing a merger of two very different programs under the one roof.

Democrats will say no – they are wedded to their own I-bank concept


Tanya Snyder, Streetsblog's Capitol Hill editor in September 2010 after covering Congress for Pacifica and public radio, 10/07/2011 “Does the Elusive Infrastructure Bank Already Exist?

There’s not a lot of interest on Capitol Hill yet about this idea, but it could become the compromise that saves the whole I-bank concept. For now, some say, politicians that have been on the forefront of the bank idea would rather stick with their own idea (which they can then take credit for).

Rep. Rosa Delauro (D-CT) has been the primary Congressional champion of an infrastructure bank for the past 17 years. At an event yesterday sponsored by PPI, Delauro admitted that while the Ex-Im Bank was an interesting model, “Yes, I am wedded to an infrastructure bank.”

Sen. Mark Warner, an original cosponsor of the Kerry-Hutchison BUILD Act, gave a similarly cautious welcome to the Ex-Im Bank proposal. “I’ve not given that enough thought, but I think it’s something that ought to be examined,” he said yesterday. He did say that he and his cohorts have always thought of the Ex-Im Bank as a far closer model for the infrastructure bank than Fannie and Freddie.

Delauro also said simply expanding TIFIA or strengthening state infrastructure banks wouldn’t “meet the aims” of a national infrastructure bank. And she “applauded” the Kerry-Hutchison proposal but said hers would issue bonds and be capitalized at $20 billion, not $10 billion. “Without the enhanced finance capacity we may not be able to get to a scale that we need to properly address the jobs crisis that we face in this country and meet a bank’s potential to be able reduce our infrastructure investment deficit and enhance our global competitiveness,” Delauro said. “It’s good, it’s great, but it’s not where we could go with this concept.”

Whatever form it takes, Delauro insisted that the U.S. must not go on as “one of the only leading nations without a national plan for public-private partnerships for infrastructure projects or a national infrastructure bank to finance large scale projects and to leverage private capital.”



Solvency Turn- High Speed Rail is a go green initiative, EX-import will say no


Justin Guay Published: April 12, The writer is Washington representative of the Sierra Club International Climate Program http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/the-ex-im-bank-ignores-clean-energy opportunities/2012/04/12/gIQAJU7aDT_story.html

The April 9 editorial “Impasse over the Ex-Im” missed the boat on the Export-Import Bank’s congressionally mandated renewable-energy target — and the tremendous opportunity that clean-energy exports pose for the U.S. economy. Clean energy is a $260 billion global industry whose exports create far more jobs per dollar invested than do investments in traditional fossil fuels. If institutions such as the Ex-Im Bank fail to ensure American business opportunities in this fast-growing market, our competitiveness, along with our environment, will be directly threatened. Unfortunately, however, Ex-Im has ignored its renewables requirement for decades, with no penalty. To date, the highest portion of its portfolio dedicated to this important sector was less than 1 percent. The bank also provides more fossil fuel financing than any federal source, including loans for the world’s largest and most polluting coal-fired power plants, in India and South Africa. This is a catastrophe for the climate, our economy and our jobs.¶ The Obama administration has called for an end to wasteful fossil fuel subsidies. If anything, Congress must justify the Ex-Im Bank’s existence as a modern economic institution by ditching fossil fuel finance and increasing the renewable-energy requirement along with penalties for noncompliance.


Ex-Import fails extension by Majority, it’s entirely too expensive
by JILLIAN LANE on MAY 16, 2012


WASHINGTON, D.C – On May 16, the U.S. Senate voted on a series of amendments to the Export-Import Reauthorization bill (H.R. 2072), including one introduced by Sen. Rand Paul that would prohibit Ex-Im financing to countries that own U.S. debt. The amendment failed, with a vote of 89-9.¶ Prior to the vote, Sen. Paul took to the Senate floor to describe the benefit of adopting his amendment and ending corporate welfare.¶ “First, we borrow billions of dollars from China, India, and Saudi Arabia then we loan it back to them again.¶ Republicans rightly complain that we’re sending taxpayer money to the President’s major donors at Solyndra and Bright Source. Now Republicans need to be consistent and say we’re not going to send Ex-Im loans to even bigger companies who are even more profitable. If it is wrong for the government to choose winners and send your money to corporations, we should say it’s wrong and we should vote against this.¶ Anybody remember the President threatening to increase taxes on corporate jets? Ex-Import banks are now going to increase the loans for corporate jets tenfold.¶ My amendment will stop this charade. My amendment will stop sending taxpayer dollars overseas to countries who we already are borrowing money from. It makes no sense, and the time has come to stop it.”

Tax-payers check, Counter-plan can’t solve


Ike Brannon and Elizabeth Lowell l May 2011, http://americanactionforum.org/sites/default/files/Ex-Im%20Final%20Draft21.pdf (American Auction Forum)

Ex-Im is considered selfsustaining and does not require annual ¶ appropriations. However, its mandate to provide ¶ loans too risky for the private sector makes taxpayers ¶ responsible for guaranteeing loans with a relatively ¶ high risk of default, raising the possibility of the need ¶ for taxpayer resources at some point in the future. ¶ Ex-Im’s budget analysis should be reviewed critically ¶ given the inherent challenge in predicting the costs of ¶ loans and guarantees accurately
No guarantee for the projects, EX-import invests into
Ike Brannon and Elizabeth Lowell l May 2011, http://americanactionforum.org/sites/default/files/Ex-Im%20Final%20Draft21.pdf (American Auction Forum)

Ex-Im’s financing ¶ may help create jobs in specific industries. However, ¶ for the economy as a whole export financing merely ¶ redistributes jobs across the economy rather than ¶ create more overall jobs. In addition, Ex-Im’s ¶ economic impact analysis process may be insufficient ¶ to guard against risks such as harm to U.S. industries that compete with subsidized foreign purchasers of ¶ U.S. exports.

Counter-plan will expect major delays


Ike Brannon and Elizabeth Lowell l May 2011, http://americanactionforum.org/sites/default/files/Ex-Im%20Final%20Draft21.pdf (American Auction Forum)

Ex-Im faces a number of ¶ challenges in satisfying conflicting congressional and ¶ political mandates, such as meeting specific targets ¶ for providing financing to small businesses, minority ¶ and women-owned businesses, and producers of ¶ environmentally beneficial exports while playing a ¶ key role in achieving the President’s goal of doubling ¶ exports in five years.

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