Up and down the Atlantic coast, US ports are abuzz. Dredging machines, tunnel excavators, and highway pavers from Miami to New York are preparing metropolitan economies and their ports for a newly expanded Panama Canal. As the thinking goes, an expanded Canal promises bigger ships, bigger cargo loads–and each metro wants a piece of the bigger business.
But lost in this port-related arms race is what the newly-widened Panama Canal means for the US economy . Too many metropolitan areas simply assume they’ll immediately acquire new freight business when the expanded Canal opens, or that there will be more business at all. These billion-dollar assumptions ignore a more fundamental question: how and where will the Panama Canal affect US’ global goods trade?
Answering that question requires a broader view, one less predicated on ship size and more on economy size. It also requires metropolitan areas to gain a better understanding of their goods trading relationships, and how those relationships power their local economies.
It’s time to have a frank conversation about what investments like the Panama Canal mean for US trade and economic growth.
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