US: Obama speeds up stimulus spending
08 Jun 2009 11:05 PM
WASHINGTON, June 8 AFP - US President Barack Obama announced on Monday he would ramp up economic stimulus spending over the next three months in a bid to save or create 600,000 jobs through summer youth programs, schools and public works.
Obama is giving a boost to the spending just as White House aides have sought to tamp down expectations of what impact his $US787 billion ($A981.54 billion) stimulus plan will have on soaring unemployment rates.
In a statement, the White House said the 600,000 jobs represented "four times the number created or saved in the first 100 days" of the Obama administration -- approximately 150,000 jobs. So far, 135 billion dollars have already been obligated under the stimulus.
A formal announcement was expected at a Cabinet meeting later Monday during which Vice President Joe Biden was to present a "Roadmap to Recovery," billed by the White House as an "administration-wide effort to accelerate implementation" of the stimulus plan.
The programs to be announced, some of which are already in place, included improvements on 98 airports and over 1,500 highways, federal funding for 135,000 education jobs and maintenance work at 359 military bases and other facilities.
"We have a long way to go on our road to recovery but we are going the right way," Obama said in a statement.
"Our measure of progress is the progress the American people see in their own lives. And until that progress is steady and solid; we're going to keep moving forward. We will not grow complacent or rest. Surely and steadily, we will turn this economy around."
Biden, meanwhile, promised to "get more dollars out the door, more shovels into the ground and more money into the pockets of workers and families who need it most."
The move came as government data showed a jump in the unemployment rate to 9.4 per cent in May, a new 26-year high, despite the number of job losses slowing to 345,000, which was better than had been expected.
White House economic adviser Austan Goolsbee warned that the unemployment rate was likely to continue to rise as more stimulus projects receive federal funding.
"I don't think there's any question it's going to be a rough patch not just in the immediate term, but for a little bit of time," he told "Fox News Sunday."
"You've got to turn the economy around, and jobs and job growth tend to come after you turn the economy around. So it's likely going to be a little higher."
Obama's senior adviser David Axelrod pointed to the better-than-expected job losses in May as a sign that the stimulus was working.
"Hopefully, that is a sign that this is turning," he told CNN on Sunday.
"While it's going to take some time for these unemployment numbers to turn around, for the momentum to completely stop and turn in the other direction, it feels as if we are moving."
Under the plans detailed Monday, federal agencies would release billions of dollars to help fund projects to shore up the ailing job market.
Some 1,129 health centres would expand their services to about 300,000 patients, while the Interior Department would begin work on 107 national parks, the Labor Department would create 125,000 summer youth jobs and improvements would be undertaken at 90 veterans medical centres.
About 5,000 law enforcement officers would also keep their jobs or be hired, while the Department of Agriculture would start 200 new waste and water systems in rural areas and the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) would begin or accelerate cleanup at 20 hazardous waste sites.
