Trillions of dollars in government spending will profoundly affect the labor market, but in ways hard to measure, and mostly under the surface.
It has never exactly been boom times for the archaeology profession, but this past year comes close — thanks to Congress.
Kim Redman runs Alpine Archaeological Consultants, a firm that searches for historically or culturally valuable artifacts in the path of construction — an essential step for federally assisted projects. For decades, she has hired temporary workers (affectionately known as “shovel bums”) to comb the ground.
These days, she’s bringing on as many full-timers as she can, as billions of dollars in infrastructure appropriations make their way down through the states.
“If you’re going to build a road, we’re at the beginning of the process,” Ms. Redman said. “The opportunities in archaeology are immense right now — everybody’s trying to hire so we can meet the demand.”
Archaeologists are on the leading edge of a wave of jobs that will result from $1.2 trillion in direct government spending from the 2021 Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act. Two subsequent initiatives — $370 billion in incentives and grants for lower-emissions energy projects provided by the Inflation Reduction Act, and $53 billion in subsidies for semiconductor manufacturing funded by the CHIPS Act — are expected to leverage tens of billions more in private capital.
The primary purpose of the three laws isn’t to stimulate the economy; they are mainly...
The SP chief also dismissed the govt’s claims of mobile phone manufacturing in the state, saying only the assembly of devices was taking place with components imported from China, Taiwan and Korea ...