President Trump’s State of the Union address earlier this week provided an interesting glimpse into his priorities for 2018 and beyond. For the first time in more than 20 years, a sitting president highlighted the importance of infrastructure development as one of the top priorities for his administration this year. Given the economic environment as well as the regulatory climate, what other good things can we expect from this president? His speech on Tuesday gives us an idea.
The president encouraged Congress to approve a $1.5-trillion plan that would consist of federal, state, and local funding as well as public-private sector partnerships. Some have suggested raising the federal gas taxes by 25-cents. Most transportation, construction, and business groups support this idea to increase funding for our nation’s transportation networks. And while I’m not one for increasing taxes, I do believe we must pursue creative ways for funding our nation’s infrastructure network so that businesses of all types, not only chemical distributors, can function effectively.
I was also encouraged to hear the president highlight successes like tax reform as well as job growth. I was proud to hear him say that “Since the election, we have created 2.4 million new jobs, including 200,000 new jobs in manufacturing alone.”
While the president didn’t spend a great deal of time highlighting the accomplishments of his deregulation platform, the administration continues to demonstrate tangible results to limit unnecessary new requirements. These deregulatory efforts include weeding out rules that are simply outdated, are not applicable or most importantly are redundant. In many cases, these actions allow agencies to be more efficient with their time and resources while enabling America’s businesses to do what they do best: grow our national economy.
Finally, it was good to hear the Commander-in-Chief address the elephant in the room: civil discord and the need to resume bipartisanship. It’s time for our political leaders on both sides of the aisle to check their egos at the door and start making hay of the limited window of opportunity that exists during an election year. Both parties can and should approve a budget, immigration reform and infrastructure development. As the president eluded to Tuesday night, we must be one nation, not a divided one.