O'Reilly: China And India Are “Not Investing” In Infrastructure

From the January 24 edition of Fox News' The O'Reilly Factor:

WILLIAMS: But the idea here [Obama]'s going to be selling tomorrow night is, look, China's more competitive, India's more competitive, so we've got to invest. It's not what the Republicans say, in terms of add additional spending, or what you, Bill O'Reilly, call social justice spending.

O'REILLY: Look, let me break this to you, Juan.

WILLIAMS: He's going to say it's investment spending.

HAM: It's still spending.

O'REILLY: Let me break this to you, Juan, to President Obama, and to all the left-wingers out there. Alright?

WILLIAMS: Yeah.

O'REILLY: China and India don't invest anything in their infrastructure other than to saying, in China's situation, you do what we say or we shoot you. OK? India, it's chaos. Have you been to India? Absolute chaos, alright? So they're not investing.

WILLIAMS: Yeah, but you know that China does invest in its economies.

O'REILLY: We're not going to be any more competitive if the government continues to spend more money. That's not going to make us more competitive.[Fox News, The O'Reilly Factor, 1/24/11]

China Is Investing Billions In Infrastructure

WaPo: China's Economic Stimulus Is “Infrastructure, Infrastructure And More Infrastructure.” The Washington Post reported:

Unlike in the United States -- where President Obama's large stimulus plan became the subject of protracted congressional wrangling and was shaped to include tax cuts and aid to states -- Chinese leaders followed a simple mandate: Spend and build.

Forget the tax cuts; in China, it was infrastructure, infrastructure and more infrastructure.

China was already awash in big-ticket construction projects. The stimulus allowed China to speed up some projects, begin digging on others and extend the building boom to less-developed areas in the country's west and north. The result, 18 months after the stimulus was introduced, is an astonishing frenzy of building -- highways, subways, airports, bridges, high-speed rail lines and even new cities constructed, literally, in the middle of nowhere.

China is building tens of thousands of miles of expressways at a pace unseen since the U.S. interstate boom in the 1950s, and it is on track to pass the United States in total highways in the next decade. Among other infrastructure projects -- which now amount to 15 percent of China's gross domestic product -- are nearly 100 new airports, some serving isolated cities few outsiders have heard of, and dozens of subways. [Washington Post, 6/18/10]

National Geographic: China To Invest $15 Billion In “Advanced Vehicle Technology And Infrastructure” National Geographic reported:

Today, it's not just car companies jockeying for position in a potential EV boom in China. The government has pledged to invest 100 billion renminbi ($15 billion) over the next decade to develop advanced vehicle technology and infrastructure, and companies such as Siemens and ECOtality are hoping to provide charging stations for the country's electric cars. According to Pike Research forecasts, China will garner as much as 48 percent of an estimated $1.9 billion in sales of charging equipment globally by 2015. [National Geographic, 1/5/11]

Pew: In 2009, China Was World's Biggest Investor In Clean Energy. From a March 25, 2010, Pew press release titled, “Pew Study: China Leads G-20 Members in Clean Energy Finance and Investment”:

WASHINGTON - For the first time, China led the United States and other G-20 members in 2009 clean energy investments and finance, according to data released today by The Pew Charitable Trusts. Last year, China invested $34.6 billion in the clean energy economy - nearly double the United States' total of $18.6 billion. Over the last five years, the United States also trailed five G-20 members (Turkey, Brazil, China, the United Kingdom, and Italy) in the rate of clean energy investment growth. [PewGlobalWarming.org, 3/25/10]

The Telegraph: China To Invest $190 Billion In Infrastructure Projects To Merge Nine Cities. From a January 24 article in The Telegraph:

City planners in south China have laid out an ambitious plan to merge together the nine cities that lie around the Pearl River Delta.

The “Turn The Pearl River Delta Into One” scheme will create a 16,000 sq mile urban area that is 26 times larger geographically than Greater London, or twice the size of Wales.

The new mega-city will cover a large part of China's manufacturing heartland, stretching from Guangzhou to Shenzhen and including Foshan, Dongguan, Zhongshan, Zhuhai, Jiangmen, Huizhou and Zhaoqing. Together, they account for nearly a tenth of the Chinese economy.

Over the next six years, around 150 major infrastructure projects will mesh the transport, energy, water and telecommunications networks of the nine cities together, at a cost of some 2 trillion yuan (£190 billion). An express rail line will also connect the hub with nearby Hong Kong. [The Telegraph, 1/24/11]

India To Spend $1 Trillion On Infrastructure

Indian Government Has Reportedly Pledged $1 Trillion For Infrastructure Investment. Press Trust of India reported:

Seeking investments from Australia in the infrastructure sector, India today said that a free trade pact between the two countries would give a boost to the $13.79 billion bilateral commerce.

At a meeting with Australian Trade Minister Craig Emerson in Mumbai, Commerce and Industry Minister Anand Sharma said, “There is a need for investments from Australia, especially in the infrastructure sector.”

India has an ambitious plan to invest $1 trillion in infrastructure during the 12th plan period (2012-2017). [Press Trust of India, 1/24/11 via Business Standard]