No one can know when the economic crisis will begin to ease, but President Obama provided welcome reassurance in his weekly radio address Saturday.
The jobs report for June showed a sharp rise in unemployment. Currently 14.7 million Americans are unemployed and economists predicted that the national jobless rate will soon reach 10 percent.
In the face of this disheartening news, the president simply counseled Americans to be patient. Perhaps some were not reassured, but it seemed more sensible and well-considered advice than the alarms being raised on the left and the right.
Republicans claimed that rising unemployment proves that the administration’s $787 billion stimulus plan is not working, and is simply a waste of taxpayers’ dollars. Some argue that the effort should be abandoned.
Critics on the left declared that unemployment must be attacked with still more federal spending ”“ a second round of stimulus funds.
On Saturday, the president reminded critics on both sides that the stimulus had always been intended as a long-term initiative.
“The Recovery Act was not designed to work in four months ”“ it was designed to work over two years.” he said. “(T)his is a plan that will also accelerate greatly throughout the summer and the fall. We must let it work the way it’s supposed to, with the understanding that in any recession, unemployment tends to recover more slowly than other measures of economic activity.”
The crisis continues, but the administration has taken effective steps to stabilize the financial system, create new jobs and stabilize existing employment. For those out of work, the government has extended unemployment benefits and helped continue health insurance coverage.
It has also provided tax relief to individuals and businesses and vital cash to struggling state governments.
Republican critics have yet to offer any persuasive ideas about how the crisis could be managed differently, but they raise reasonable concerns about the massive federal deficit.
Eight years of mismanagement have left the nation deeply in debt and unprepared for the current crisis. President Obama has pledged to get the nation’s deficits under control, and we can only hope that his aptitude for this responsibility is greater than his predecessor’s.
Deficits and debt threaten the economy and our future. Over the long term, government must raise taxes and cut spending sufficiently to keep them in balance.
In the short term, however, government spending provides economic stimulus and economic support that we cannot do without.
— Questions? Comments? Contact Kristen Schulze Muszynski or Nick Cowenhoven at 282-1535 or kristenm@journaltribune.com or nickc@journaltribune.com.
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