WASHINGTON (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 08th May, 2021) President Joe Biden said on Friday that a disappointing jobs report for April showed the US economy wasn't overheating even as it rebounding from the coronavirus pandemic, and that more financial aid was needed to fix the country's employment crisis.
"The US economy is moving in the right direction, but there's still a long way to go," Biden told reporters after the Labor Department reported jobs growth for April at just about a quarter of expectations. "This report shows the economy is not overheating. But it also shows there's a much bigger problem and more assistance is needed."
The United States added 266,000 jobs in April versus 916,000 in March, the Labor Department said. Economists polled by US media had expected as many as 1 million new jobs for last month.
The sharp contraction in labor market growth led both Biden and US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi - the US president's top political ally in Congress - to push the administration's proposed $2.3 trillion American Jobs Plan as a long-term fix to the nation's employment crisis.
The plan largely involves rebuilding the country's infrastructure, including bridges and roads, which the administration says has been ignored for decades. Biden says it will create tens of thousands of jobs over the coming years.
Republican lawmakers argue the program is too costly, lacks focus and would bloat the already high US budget deficit, which was at a record $1.7 trillion in the first six months of fiscal year 2021.
Biden said the Republicans were underestimating the economic rehabilitation needed for America in the post-pandemic era.
"We're still digging our way out of a very deep hole we've been put in. No one should underestimate how tough this battle is," the president said.
The United States lost more than 21 million jobs between March and April 2020, at the height of business lockdowns forced by COVID-19 pandemic. More than 8 million of those jobs have not returned, officials say.
The US economy itself shrank 3.5 percent in 2020, although it grew by 6.4 percent in the first quarter of this year. The Federal Reserve has forecast an economic growth of 6.5 percent for all of 2021 although it said it does not expect "full employment" - defined by a monthly unemployment rate of 4.0 percent or lower - before 2023. Unemployment stood at 6.1 percent in April.
