(MENAFN- Arab Times) US President Barack Obama said Saturday the United States needed to do more than just reclaim jobs lost to the recession, as he called for rebuilding the economy to make it secure for future generations.
"Our mission isn't just to put people back to work - it's to rebuild an economy where that work pays; an economy in which everyone who works hard has the chance to get ahead," Obama said in his radio and Internet address.
The comment came after new Labor Department statistics showed that the June jobless rate was unchanged from May at 8.2 percent, with 12.7 million people in the ranks of the unemployed.
The United States added only 80,000 jobs in June, the third month of weak jobs growth amid a sluggish economy that has kept hiring on hold, the department data made public on Friday showed.
The figure was far below what is needed just to keep pace with growth in the labor force, signaling no relief in sight for an unemployment rate that has held above 8.0 percent for more than three years.
The disappointing report toughened the challenge ahead for Obama, who is fighting to keep his job in the November presidential election against charges by Republican challenger Mitt Romney that his administration has failed to revive the economy.
Romney argued that Friday's weak US jobs report was proof Obama's economic policies were failing, saying "this kick in the gut has got to end."
On Friday, Obama signed a bill funding scores of transportation projects across the country as well as a bill keeping interests on student loans from increasing. Both passed Congress last week
"Those steps will make a real difference in the lives of millions of Americans," the president said in the radio address. "But make no mistake: we've got more to do."
Economists were divided over whether the slump in the employment market was bad enough to push the Federal Reserve into additional stimulus for the economy at its July 31-August 1 policy board meeting.
"We do not believe today's report is sufficient to shift the Fed into action at the next FOMC meeting," Barclays analyst Michael Gapen said.
Bond-swap
Gapen noted that the Federal Open Market Committee had extended its bond-swap program to year-end at its June meeting, when the central bank slashed a half percentage point from its 2012 economic growth forecast to a tepid 2.4 percent rate at best.
Nomura economists highlighted the risk that instead of a temporary soft patch this could be the beginning of a longer-lasting downshift in economic activity.
"A persistent deterioration in labor market conditions would likely spur the Federal Reserve to adopt an even more accommodative stance," they said.
The American job machine has jammed. Again.
The economy added only 80,000 jobs in June, the government said Friday, erasing any doubt that the United States is in a summer slump for the third year in a row.
"Let's just agree: This number stinks," said Dan Greenhaus, chief global strategist at the investment firm BTIG.
It was the third consecutive month of weak job growth. From April through June, the economy produced an average of just 75,000 jobs a month, the weakest three months since August through October 2010.
The unemployment rate stayed at 8.2 percent - a recession-level figure, even though the Great Recession has technically been over for three years.
The numbers could hurt Obama's odds for re-election. Mitt Romney, the presumed Republican nominee, said they showed that Obama, in three and a half years on the job, had not "gotten America working again."
"And the president is going to have to stand up and take responsibility for it," Romney said in Wolfeboro, N.H. "This kick in the gut has got to end."
Obama, on a two-day bus tour through the contested states of Ohio and Pennsylvania, focused on private companies, which added 84,000 jobs in June, and took a longer view of the economic recovery.
"Businesses have created 4.4 million new jobs over the past 28 months, including 500,000 new manufacturing jobs," the president said. "That's a step in the right direction."
The Labor Department's report on job creation and unemployment is the most closely watched monthly indicator of the U.S. economy. There are four reports remaining before Election Day, including one on Friday, Nov. 2, four days before Americans vote.
No president since World War II has faced re-election with unemployment over 8 percent. It was 7.8 percent when Gerald Ford lost to Jimmy Carter in 1976. Ronald Reagan faced 7.2 percent unemployment in 1984 and trounced Walter Mondale.
Patrick Sims, director of research at the consulting firm Hamilton Place Strategies, said that "time has run out" for unemployment to fall below 8 percent by Election Day.
That would require an average of about 220,000 jobs a month from July through October - more like the economy's performance from January through March, when it averaged 226,000 per month.
Few economic analysts expect anything close to that.
"The labor market is treading water," said Heidi Shierholz, an economist at the Economic Policy Institute. She called it an "ongoing, severe crisis for the American work force."
The Labor Department report put investors in a sour mood.
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