Tofu projects

The U.S. is regularly accusing China of poor craftsmanship, exporting poisonous products and building shoddy projects. Indeed, there are a lot of “tofu” projects in China, built by unscrupulous contractors offering bribes to gullible officials. Roads, buildings and bridges age in a couple of years because substandard materials were used so contractors and corrupt officials could line their pockets.

But the U.S. authorities should not throw the first stone. Are all the roads, building and bridges in the U.S. safe and up to standard? The catastrophic collapse of the bridge over the Mississippi in Minneapolis showed this not to be the case. What's more, the American Society of Civil Engineers reports that as of 2003, there were about 160,570 bridges deemed structurally deficient or functionally obsolete. The number represented 27.1% of America's bridges.

Obviously, not enough funds are earmarked to repair defective infrastructure. The U.S. prefers to throw away its money in Iraq. Shouldn't a so-called “democratic” government overseeing a market economy be able to allocate funds where they are most needed? Some American economists are accusing the Chinese government of distorting the free market economy are thereby misallocating funds. The U.S. government is also misallocating its funds, letting the country's infrastructure crumble in a pile of debris. The “terrorists” didn't even have to lift a finger.