Title: Public Spending on Transportation and Water Infrastructure | Congressional Budget Office
Headings: Public Spending on Transportation and Water Infrastructure
Public Spending on Transportation and Water Infrastructure
Summary

Content: In total, lawmakers appropriated $62 billion in funding for transportation and water infrastructure under that legislation. The Congressional Budget Office expects that, in nominal terms, federal spending for transportation and water infrastructure under ARRA will total $54 billion through 2013, by which time almost 90 percent of the funds made available for infrastructure through ARRA will have been spent. The Composition of Public Spending for Transportation and Water Infrastructure
The composition of public spending on transportation and water infrastructure can be represented in three ways: by the level of government providing the funding or other form of financial support; by the nature of the spending (whether it is designated for capital projects or for operation and maintenance); and by the type of infrastructure. State and local governments account for about 75 percent of total public spending on transportation and water infrastructure—even after subtracting from their gross spending the value of grants and loan subsidies that the federal government provides for such purposes—and the federal government accounts for the other 25 percent. That split has remained roughly constant over the past two decades. In recent years, not quite half of total public funding for transportation and water infrastructure in the United States has been devoted to capital spending for activities such as construction and equipment purchases. State and local governments have accounted for about 60 percent of those expenditures, and the federal government has accounted for about 40 percent.