An infrastructure bank would also help overcome the many problems associated with the annual appropriations process and could provide the types of financial assistance that are most useful for infrastructure projects. By providing long-term loans and loan guarantees, the new bank would make year-to-year federal support significantly more predictable. Short-line railroad owners could hire employees, and clean energy operations could plan for expansion without being constrained by the uncertainty of not knowing whether the critical federal loan programs that support them will exist in a year’s time. Additionally, by building delayed-repayment mechanisms into these loans, many crucial projects could be undertaken.
