Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao was planning a big “pat-on-the-back” speech about how great the Chinese economy is doing at the ASEAN Summit this weekend. Alas, the venue in Thailand was overrun by government protestors. The Premier made the announcement anyway, saying that the economy did better than expected in the first quarter due to the huge stimulus plan put in motion by Beijing. China is due to report the first quarter growth numbers in the next few days. Another key announcement due at the ASEAN summit was about Chinese economic aid to the region. Not being able to use the Asian summit as the backdrop for the announcement of $15 billion in credit aid for its Southeast Asian neighbors and $10 billion for Asian infrastructure projects surely must have disappointed Chinese leaders. But the announcement still underscores the fact that China sees itself as a benevolent leader in its own neighborhood and wants to spend the bucks to prove it. President Obama also plans a major speech on the economy tomorrow. But there was a little preview of it today at the Department of Transportation, when the President touted “2,000 new projects to rebuild U.S. highways and bridges already approved under the $787 billion stimulus plan.” The Department received $48 billion out of the stimulus plan for federal infrastructure needs, or about 6% of the stimulus spending. Infrastructure projects are effective vehicles of job creation. http://www.americanmanufacturing.org/infrastructure-investment/ " target="_blank">A recent study done by researchers at the University of Massachusetts-Amherst’s Political Economy Research Institute (PERI) shows that for every $1 billion investment in infrastructure 18,000 jobs are created in the economy. In comparison, tax cuts would create, at best, only 14,000 jobs per $1 billion in spending. The final stimulus plan offers more than $200 billion in tax cuts, almost 5 times as much as it allocates for infrastructure investments.