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Politics : PRESIDENT GEORGE W. BUSH -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: AurumRabosa who wrote (537307)	2/9/2004 10:50:27 AM
From: DuckTapeSunroof	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 769667

White House Predicts: '2.6 Million New Jobs in '04' By REUTERS February 9, 2004 Filed at 9:27 a.m. ET nytimes.com WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The U.S. economy should shed its jobless label this year with the creation of about 2.6 million new positions, the White House forecast on Monday. If realized, the jobs turnaround could help President Bush's re-election prospects. Bush has faced withering fire from Democrats over the lack of new jobs. In the annual Economic Report of the President, the White House said the number of workers on U.S. non-farm payrolls was likely to rise to an average to 132.7 million this year from a 2003 average it thought would come in at 130.1 million. According to the latest jobs figures released by the Labor Department on Friday, which incorporated data revisions, payroll employment averaged just 129.9 million last year. Last year, the Bush administration was looking for the creation of about 1.7 million jobs. But the economy actually lost 53,000 jobs, bringing the total number of jobs lost since Bush took office to 2.2 million. ``As 2004 begins, America's economy is strong and getting stronger,'' Bush said in a statement accompanying the report. ``We are moving in the right direction, but have more to do,'' he said. ``I will not be satisfied until every American who wants a job can find one.'' The jobless nature of the recovery from the 2001 recession, which is quite unusual by historical standards, has been a hot button political issue. Democrats have regularly charged Bush with having the worst jobs creation record of any president since Herbert Hoover. In the only other post-war jobless recovery, the slow crawl back from the 1990-91 recession, it took 14 months for the number of employed to get back to where it stood when the recession ended. This time, it is 26 months and counting. The Labor Department has monthly jobs figures dating back to January 1939. In that period there is no other recovery that has gone this long without employment getting back to where it stood when the recession ended. In its report, the Bush administration projected the average level of employment to climb by a further 3.6 million in 2005, even with the economy slowing.House said employment should average 144.4 million, which would mark an increase of 14.5 million jobs from last year's average level. In part, the administration's expectation of a pick-up in jobs growth reflects a belief that growth in productivity, or worker output per hour, will slow from its recent elevated level. The fast pace of productivity gains has enabled businesses to boost output sharply with little new hiring. ``After such an extraordinary surge, a period of slower productivity growth is likely as firms shed their hesitancy to hire,'' said the report, which was prepared by the president's Council of Economic Advisers. Copyright 2004 Reuters Ltd.