Pyramids, courtesy Ricardo Liberato/Wikimedia Commons
An economic analysis released last week suggested a Peripheral Tunnel to move California’s water around the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta could create 129,000 jobs. (Good Alex Breitler story lays out the details.)
The boosters at the Southern California Water Committee jumped on the argument:
This new jobs study on the tunnel options is the first major study of its kind, and it opens our eyes to the fact that – beyond helping secure our water supply, promoting a better Delta environment and providing a monumental boost to our aging and deteriorating public infrastructure – building a new conveyance tunnel could create more than one hundred thousand new California jobs.
Awesome. But can I point out that spending $12 billion building anything will create a lot of jobs building that thing?
Personally, I think new pyramids would be awesome.
Lacking much context, it took me until I “129,000 jobs” until I worked out the headline and burst out laughing. Yes, jobs should probably be for some other purpose than only keeping people employed.
Also, there’s probably no reason a project like this should end. With the (unpatented) Sagrada Familia construction timetable they could be building the Peripheral Tunnel for a century or more. Jobs for the kids and the grandkids!
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