A new study found that the cost of road construction in the United States is heavily affected by how much competition there is among contractors who work on streets. In general, a standard deviation increase in employment per capita for the Department of Transportation led to 16 percent declines in costs, with one additional bidder linked to an 8.3 percent decline in costs for road projects, or a savings of $30,000 per lane-mile, or an average of $460,000 per project.
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