I'm a regular listener to the BBC's Documentaries podcast and during this morning's cycle I caught up with an archived episode called "Building Out of the Recession'" (2 parts).

The smooth presenter, Jonathan Glancey, travelled to New York and Chi-Town to poll the spirit of the US' present economic times and through his various interviews learned that America's GDP wasn't the only thing taking a good ol' fashioned hiding.

Glancey's main finding? As economies soar, so do their cities' buildings and skyscrapers

Have yourself a listen to this 23-minute cast (Part One) and leave a comment, if it inspired you. I'd be curious to know what your government's doing in your country to stimulate the economy through building projects.

The relevant take-aways -- country-neutral ones, mind you -- from the above clip:

• there are increasing scores of unemployed and under-employed workers around the world. That's hardly a secret. But when private-sector investment takes a beating, it is a national government's job to pick up the economic slack. For the mostly high-tax regimes of Europe, this shouldn't be too much of a problem.


• taking a page out of FDR's New Deal playbook, national governments might start considering large infrastructural projects like roads, bridges, and airports once more as a means of stimulating the economy and inspiring the population through overt physical acts, like mega-construction.

• skills atrophy, like unused muscle groups. So as a means of keeping workers' skills from getting rusty, national building projects might be one way of keeping people limber.


• for evidence of the soaring economy/tall buildings phenomenon, compare the present-day sagas of the UAE (Dubai) or Doha, London's 2012 Olympic campaign, and China's many gargantuan construction campaigns.

And for those of you game for some extra-curricular reading on this subject, dance on over to Adam Cohen's Nothing to Fear: FDR's Inner Circle and the Hundred Days That Created Modern America.