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President Barack Obama said his $787 billion stimulus bill “has worked as intended” as he pushed back against Republican criticism that his recovery program has failed to rescue the economy.

Obama, in his weekly Saturday radio and Web address, said the stimulus program is helping state governments save jobs. Were it not for the program, the president said, “state deficits would be nearly twice as large as they are now, resulting in tens of thousands of additional layoffs — layoffs that would affect police officers, teachers, and firefighters.”

Source: Bloomberg

President Barack Obama’s $787 billion economic stimulus package will help put 14,200 teens and young adults to work this summer in Ohio, and most of the stimulus-funded highway projects in the state are reaching economically distressed areas, according to a federal report released Wednesday.

Source: CNBC, AP

~News submitted by upthecreek

President Obama today promised to deliver more than 600,000 new jobs this summer with accelerated spending of some of the $787-billion economic stimulus that Congress approved at his urging earlier this year.

The jobs are to be created with the increased spending on maintenance projects at military bases, about 1,600 road and airport projects, the hiring of some 135,000 teachers and other school staffers and 125,000 summer jobs for youth under the supervision of the Department of Labor.

Source: LA Times

President Barack Obama said General Motors Corp. will reemerge from financial turmoil a “strong company” and that permitting it and Chrysler LLC to collapse could have triggered an economic depression.

GM got $4 billion in additional assistance to continue operations. Chrysler is reorganizing in a Chapter 11 bankruptcy.

Source: Bloomberg

President Obama today sought to temper recent optimism about an economic recovery, warning that the “hard times” will not end this year and there will be “more job loss, more foreclosures and more pain” before the recession ends.

While warning of future economic hardship, Obama also touted the encouraging signs in the economy as springing from the “extraordinary action” of his administration, including the $787-billion economic stimulus legislation, that he said have helped spur consumer demand and restore the flow of credit vital to businesses.

Source: LA Times

According to Reuters: “U.S. President Barack Obama will announce steps on Monday to make it easier for small business owners to borrow money, using $730 million in stimulus funds to cut lending fees, boost loan guarantees and expand other programs, officials said.”

Obama has said twice in the past few days that Caterpillar CEO James Owens indicated his company would be able to rehire some of the 20,000 recently laid-off employees. “Yesterday, Jim, the head of Caterpillar, said that if Congress passes our plan, this company will be able to rehire some of the folks who were just laid off,” Obama said in Peoria.

But when asked if the stimulus could do that, Owens said, “I think, realistically, no. The honest reality is we’re probably going to have more layoffs before we start hiring again.”

Source: ABC News

According to CNN Money: “President-elect Obama said Saturday an analysis of his stimulus proposals shows that between 3 million and 4 million U.S. jobs could be saved or created by 2010, nearly 90% of them in the private sector.”

• The analysis of Obama’s estimated $800 billion plan to lift the country out of a year-long recession
• The proposal targets alternative energy and infrastructure for investments to save existing jobs and create new ones

According to NYTimes: “President-elect Barack Obama and Congressional Democrats are considering major expansions of government-assisted health care insurance and unemployment compensation as they begin intensive work this week on a two-year economic recovery package.”

“Other policy changes would subsidize employers’ expenses for temporarily continuing health insurance coverage to laid-off and retired workers and their dependents, as mandated under a 22-year-old federal law known as Cobra, and allow workers who lose jobs that did not come with insurance benefits to be eligible, for the first time, to apply for Medicaid coverage.”

“Obama advisers have said the package will carry a total cost of at least $775 billion.“

According to Bloomberg: “The share of consumers who said jobs are plentiful fell to 6.2 percent, the lowest level in 16 years, from 8.7 percent last month, today’s report showed. The proportion of people who said jobs are hard to get increased to 42 percent from 37.1 percent.”

“That wasn’t enough to overcome the damage from the loss of 1.9 million jobs and a slump in household wealth after the collapse of home and stock prices.”

“The jobless rate could reach 8.2 percent at the end of next year compared with last month’s 15-year high of 6.7 percent, according to the survey.”

“President-elect Barack Obama has expanded his economic stimulus goals and called for creating or saving 3 million jobs over the next two years. Vice President-elect Joe Biden said Dec. 23 the incoming administration and congressional leaders are nearing an agreement on the broad principles of a stimulus policy.”

According to CNN: “President-elect Barack Obama named key members of his administration’s economic team Monday, including New York Federal Reserve President Timothy Geithner as his Treasury Secretary nominee and former Harvard President Lawrence Summers as the director of the National Economic Council.”

“Mission No. 1 over the next few weeks for Obama’s economic team will be hammering out the details of what the president-elect described this weekend as a two-year economic recovery plan intended to create 2.5 million jobs.

Estimates for how much might be spent on a multi-year stimulus package range as high as $500 billion to $700 billion.“

According to CNN: “Saying that moving quickly is imperative, President-elect Barack Obama on Saturday offered an outline of his economic recovery plan to create 2.5 million jobs by 2011, saying American workers will rebuild the nation’s roads and bridges, modernize its schools and create more sources of alternative energy.”