Public Spending on Transportation and Water Infrastructure, 1956 to 2023
Presentation
In 2023, spending by federal, state, and local governments for transportation and water infrastructure totaled $626 billion. This slide deck updates information that CBO released in 2018.
The Congressional Budget Office has regularly published a report that documents trends in public spending for infrastructure. Here, CBO has updated the exhibits featured in that report through 2023.
There are six types of transportation and water infrastructure that are paid for largely by the public sector:
Highways,
Mass transit and rail,
Aviation,
Water transportation,
Water resources, and
Water utilities.
Federal, state, and local governments spent $626 billion on those types of infrastructure in 2023. That amount equaled about 2.3 percent of gross domestic product. Highway spending accounted for the largest component of that total, $249 billion, followed by spending on water utilities and mass transit and rail.
