Greece’s debt rating may be cut within a month as it struggles to pare the European Union’s largest budget deficit, driving up borrowing costs and renewing pressure on the euro.
Standard & Poor’s said late yesterday it may lower its BBB+ rating by the end of March and Moody’s Investors Service said today it may reduce its A2 grade in a few months. The warnings further complicate the government’s effort to persuade investors that it can slash its fiscal shortfall from last year’s 12.7 percent of gross domestic product.
The euro slumped to a one-year low against the yen, most stocks dropped and the premium on Greek 10-year bonds over German debt widened to the most since Feb. 8 on concern that the country may need EU assistance to avoid missing debt payments. Unions yesterday staged a strike to protest Prime Minister George Papandreou’s drive to slash spending.
“It’s getting more difficult than anticipated for the Greek government to implement the spending cuts it promised,” said Susumu Kato, chief economist in Tokyo at Credit Agricole Securities Asia. Further downgrades “may spread sovereign concerns through other European nations,” he said.
The country’s willingness to keep funding itself in the commercial bond market is key to S&P’s assessment, the company said. The rating could be pressured by lower profitability at the country’s banks or a decline in public support for the budget plan, it said. EU assistance could help if it was likely to lead to a “sustained reduction” in borrowing costs.
Two Grades
“We believe that a further downgrade of Greece of one to two notches is possible within a month,” S&P analysts led by Marko Mrsnik in London said in a statement.
Pierre Cailleteau, managing director of sovereign risk at Moody’s, said in an interview in Tokyo today it may act “in a few months” if policy makers appear to be deviating from their deficit-reduction plan. At the same time, Moody’s may stabilize its rating if Greece follows through with its austerity measures, he said.
“We have to let the government implement its plans,” Cailleteau said. “You can’t expect a government to be able to turn around public finances in a few days.”
S&P cut Greece’s rating in December from A- and signaled at the time it may reduce it again from BBB+. Moody’s lowered its rating by one step the same month.
ECB Rules
If Moody’s cuts its credit rating to the same level as the other major ratings companies, it could exacerbate Greece’s financial distress at the end of this year when the European Central Bank is due to revert to old collateral rules that were loosened during the global recession. Greek government bonds would then no longer be eligible as collateral at the ECB, making it even more difficult for the nation to borrow.
The euro dropped to 120.51 yen as of 11:20 a.m. in London from 122 cash advance america.03 yen in New York yesterday. It earlier touched 120.24 yen, the lowest since Feb. 24, 2009. The single currency has fallen about 6 percent against the dollar this year on concern Greece’s fiscal woes may extend to Spain, Portugal and other European nations seeking to pare budget gaps.
Credit-default swaps protecting the debt of Greece rose 10 basis points to 392, according to CMA DataVision. The spread between 10-year Greek bonds and similar-maturity German debt widened by 13 basis points, or 0.13 percentage point, to 352 basis points.
Tear Gas
Papandreou’s government is running into opposition at home to its strategy. Air-traffic controllers, customs and tax officials, train drivers, doctors at state-run hospitals and school teachers walked off the job yesterday to protest spending cuts. Police fired tear-gas and clashed with demonstrators in central Athens after a march organized by labor unions.
Greek bonds have slumped, driving up borrowing costs, as investors fear the government will fail to meet its pledge to cut its budget gap to 8.7 percent of GDP this year. It aims to cut the deficit below the EU’s 3 percent limit in 2012.
The premium investors demand to hold Greece’s 10-year securities instead of Germany’s rose to the most in more than two weeks.
The government needs to sell 53 billion euros ($72 billion) of debt this year, the equivalent of 20 percent of GDP. The yield on the country’s two-year note yesterday rose to the most since Feb. 9.
EU governments are looking for guarantees that Papandreou will slash spending before they spell out what help they may offer. EU and ECB officials visited Athens this week to verify that budget cuts are being implemented.
Additional Measures
Under proposals adopted this month by euro-area finance ministers, the Greek government will have to take additional measures to cut its budget gap if it fails to satisfy the European Commission next month that its current strategy is on track. These may include higher value-added tax, a levy on luxury goods, higher energy taxes and spending cuts, they said.
“There will be some conditions attached” to European assistance for Greece, Cailleteau said. “I don’t see the evidence that would justify these kinds of assertions that Europe will not help Greece.”
German, French and Greek voters are “in denial” about Greece’s ability to get its deficit under control without external aid, Barry Eichengreen, an economics professor at the University of California at Berkeley and author of a 2006 history of the European economy, said in a Bloomberg Television interview yesterday.
Finance Minister George Papaconstantinou said Feb. 23 that the government will do “everything it needs to meet” its targets and that any decisions on possible new measures will be announced after talks with European governments.
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Virginia Power is committing $4 billion over the next three years to improve and expand its electric service.
Dominion Virginia Power CEO Paul Koonce, in a letter to be included with bills sent to Virginia customers in January, outlines plans for improving service reliability and adding more renewable sources of energy.
Koonce was named chief executive in June.
"Keeping your lights on safely, efficiently and at a reasonable cost are my highest priorities,"Koonce said in the letter.
To keep up with growing demand, the company will add new, gas-fired generating units and a hybrid coal station. It is also making environmental improvements to older stations to reduce emissions.
Dominion says it is committed to meeting Virginia's goal of achieving 15 percent of its electricity sales from renewable sources by 20205, and to reducing the growth in customer demand for electricity by 10 percent over the next 12 years high quality business cards.
"Meeting these goals will be a challenge," Koonce says. "Despite the recession, customers are using more power, lending credence to the forecast that demand will rebound as the economy recovers."
Dominion Virginia Power plans to offer new energy efficiency programs this year for both residential and business customers, and digital meters are now being installed in some of its service areas.
Last summer, Dominion (NYSE: D) applied for $200 million in federal stimulus money to speed up the installation of 2.4 million smart meters.
U.K. consumer confidence fell for a second month in December, complicating Prime Minister Gordon Brown’s efforts to revive his popularity before next year’s election, market researcher GfK NOP said.
An index of consumer sentiment dropped to minus 19 from minus 17 the previous month, GfK NOP said in an e-mailed statement today in London. A gauge of expectations for the economy over the next year fell nine points to minus six.
“This must be concerning for the government,” Nick Moon, an analyst at GfK, said in the statement. “What will be particularly worrying for Gordon Brown is that the index for the state of the economy, which had crept into positive territory, has fallen by a substantial nine points.”
Brown, who must call an election by June, is struggling to claw back the support lost to the opposition Conservatives during the financial crisis. Bank of England policy maker Kate Barker said Dec. 15 an economic recovery will be “bumpy,” and data released yesterday showed British retail sales unexpectedly fell in November for the first time in six months.
Retail sales growth will “fizzle out” next month, and trading conditions across the industry are likely to “remain challenging” in 2010, the Confederation of British Industry said yesterday instant personal loans guaranteed.
A gauge of the economy’s performance over the past year slipped two points to minus 61. A measure of consumers’ willingness to buy big items such as refrigerators and furniture rose three points to minus 16, GfK said.
Housing Recovery?
British consumers are still adapting to a recession that sparked the country’s worst housing slump since the early 1990s and has led to 600,000 job losses, pushing the unemployment rate to 7.8 percent. Barker said she would be “surprised” if the recent pick up in property prices were sustained next year as unemployment threatens household finances.
The market researcher surveyed 2,004 people between Dec. 4 and Dec. 12 on behalf of the European Commission. The margin of error is estimated at two percentage points, the report said.
There’s something different about the Masters’ Select Funds. Though it’s not unusual for a team of professionals to manage mutual funds, these offerings put a fresh spin on it.
Rather than bulk up with an in-house team of analysts and portfolio managers to establish the Masters’ Select Funds, Litman/Gregory Fund Advisors chose to play overseer. It hired highly regarded money managers as subadvisers — each responsible for a portion of one of its funds.
"Each manager has a very concentrated mandate to own only eight to 15 of their best ideas," says Chief Investment Officer Jeremy DeGroot. The funds are diversified from the different styles in investment philosophies of each manager, so there’s a broader mix of industries and stocks.
The largest fund is top-rated Master’s Select International Fund, with $1.4 billion in assets and a return of just more than 39 percent this year. Its five-year annualized return of 7.6 percent still places it among the top in Morningstar’s foreign large blend fund category.
DeGroot recently offered insight on his market perspective:
What’s your take on the market rally we’ve seen this year, and what do you expect lies ahead?
I want to be clear that Litman/Gregory’s view doesn’t impact how the Masters Funds are invested since those funds are built stock by stock by the managers. The reason I’m saying that is because Litman/Gregory is not that optimistic about stock returns looking out three to five years from now.
We think the consumers’ need to increase savings and rebuild their balance sheets is going to lead to slower growth in consumption.
That among other factors will lead to reduced earnings growth for companies. So in terms of outlook, we’re kind of in the subpar economic recovery group. We’re not in the V-shaped economic recovery group.
What’s guiding that outlook?
The market is expecting a stronger earnings recovery than we think is likely.
We think the baseline case scenario is for subpar recovery coming out of this recession. That’s because of the overhang of debt in our economy — because of all the government spending, the huge deficit that’s likely to lead to higher interest rates down the road, probably higher taxes on individuals. Those are not going to be positive for economic growth.
After taking a hit, don’t consumers usually return to being fat and happy — shaking off what ails them?
This time is different from most typical economic cycles in that this recession is more of a balance sheet recession. It wasn’t caused by the Federal Reserve worrying about inflation and an overheating economy and raising rates — leading to a contraction in consumer credit and a reduction in spending and business inventories getting cut. That did happen, but that’s not really what triggered the recession. We’re building debt upon debt, and we’re overspending our income for a number of decades.
Historically there have been some studies that have looked at the after-effects of balance sheet recessions, and they take much longer for economies to rebound. Unemployment usually stays significantly higher than it does in a normal recession. You know the Fed can’t lower rates any more. They’re doing other things to increase liquidity. We’re always hesitant, as everyone in the investment business is, to say it’s different this time. But it’s different from the typical cycle in our view.
Are there any factors that would trigger you to adopt the more positive scenario?
We think there has to be a significant reduction in household debt levels. We think it’s going to happen, hopefully fairly gradually, but when that happens, that is a headwind to growth. But we also think there are some worst-case scenarios for subpar growth where there could be a significant decline in the dollar. We expect a modest sustained gradual decline because it’s in no one’s interest to have the dollar crash.
With all the turmoil in the market over the last few years, has your firm’s team approach been tested?
We talk to managers about their mistakes a lot. And we think you really learn about the person, the team and their mind-set. If they’re willing to admit their mistakes and learn from them or if their ego is too big to really even acknowledge it.
The bottom line is that we removed one manager in the fall of last year, not based on short-term performance. It had been a process of reassessing over a couple of years, but with the other mangers we reconfirmed our confidence in their ability to perform well.
Federal Reserve Chairman Ben S. Bernanke said a “strong case” can be made for keeping the central bank involved in bank supervision, and subjecting interest rate policy to congressional audits may undermine confidence in monetary policy. “There is a strong case for a continued role for the Federal Reserve in bank supervision,” the Fed Chairman said in a commentary released today on the Web site of the Washington Post. “Because of our role in making monetary policy, the Fed brings unparalleled economic and financial expertise to its oversight of banks.”
Bernanke has presided over the most expansive use of Fed powers since the Great Depression. While the 55-year-old Fed chairman has said he averted a financial meltdown, lawmakers have voiced concern about potential taxpayer losses and proposed the most sweeping dismantlement of Fed authority since the creation of the institution in 1913.
The Fed chairman said legislation under consideration in Congress would impair the ability of the central bank to fulfill its basic functions.
“A number of the legislative proposals being circulated would significantly reduce the capacity of the Federal Reserve to perform its core functions,” he said. “Now more than ever, America needs a strong, nonpolitical and independent central bank with the tools to promote financial stability and to help steer our economy to recovery without inflation.”
Lax Supervision
Senate Banking Committee Christopher Dodd, a Democrat from Connecticut, has criticized the central bank for lax supervision and introduced legislation this month that would strip bank oversight from the Fed and create a single bank regulator. Dodd would also limit the central bank’s ability to loan to individual companies.
“Congress has a lot of public support for an attack on the Fed,” Allan Meltzer, a Fed historian and professor at Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh, said in an interview Nov. 23. “They bailed out everybody in sight.”
The Standard & Poor’s 500 Index slid 1.7 percent to 1,091.49 in New York while two-year Treasury yields fell to the lowest level since December.
Dodd and Representative Barney Frank, chairman of the House Financial Services Committee, want to take away the Fed’s rule- writing power on consumer financial products and give it to a new Consumer Financial Protection Agency.
“The Federal Reserve, like other regulators around the world, did not do all that it could have to constrain excessive risk-taking in the financial sector in the period leading up to the crisis,” Bernanke said. The Fed has reviewed its performance and “moved aggressively to fix the problems,” he added easy payday loans.
Trigger Losses
As the subprime mortgage crisis began to trigger losses in bank portfolios, Bernanke used emergency authority last year to purchase securities from Bear Stearns Cos. and facilitate its merger with JPMorgan Chase & Co.
Bernanke also pushed the Fed’s backstop lending beyond banks, setting up programs to support the commercial paper and asset-backed securities markets. The Fed Board approved the bank holding company applications of Goldman Sachs Group Inc. and Morgan Stanley, giving them access to the Fed’s loan window.
Under Bernanke, the Fed has more than doubled its assets to $2.21 trillion and become the lender of last resort to government bond dealers, banks, Wall Street firms and U.S. corporations. The central bank has also propped up markets for mortgage-backed and asset-backed securities that support credit to consumers, small businesses and commercial real estate.
Reform Bill
A financial regulatory reform bill proposed by Frank, a Democrat from Massachusetts, would limit Fed emergency lending to broadly available credit programs. The Frank bill preserves the Obama administration’s proposal to make the Fed the lead regulator of risk across the financial system.
The central bank’s independence is also under fire from both chambers of Congress. Frank’s committee advanced a proposal this month to remove a three-decade ban on congressional audits of Fed interest-rate decisions. The proposal was offered by Representative Ron Paul, a Republican from Texas, and based on a bill with more than 300 co-sponsors.
Bernanke said studies show that central banks independent of political influence tend to keep inflation and interest rates lower than their less independent counterparts.
“The general repeal of that exemption would serve only to increase the perceived influence of Congress on monetary policy decisions, which would undermine the confidence the public and the markets have in the Fed to act in the long-term economic interest of the nation,” Bernanke said.
Under the proposal by Dodd, commercial banks would lose their power to appoint directors of the 12 regional Fed banks. Instead, directors would be chosen by the Fed’s Senate-confirmed governors, and each board chairman would be appointed by the president of the United States and subject to Senate approval.
The proposal would create political oversight of the Fed bank presidents, who are among the most vocal proponents on the Federal Open Market Committee for keeping inflation low.
Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner on Saturday stressed the necessity of keeping global economic stimulus in place until recovery is assured and opposed the utility of a tax on financial transactions as a way to dampen risky bank behavior.
Speaking at the conclusion of a two-day meeting of Group of 20 finance minister and central bankers, Geithner said there was broad agreement that “growth remains the dominant policy imperative across our economies.”
He said high U.S. unemployment, which hit a 26-1/2-year high at 10.2 percent of the civilian workforce in October, highlighted a “very tough economic environment” that will a period of sustained growth to correct.
Earlier, British Prime Minister Gordon Brown had suggested that the G20 should levy on banks — blamed for the excessive risk-taking that led the world into a now-easing financial crisis — and used the proceeds to fund future bailouts.
Geithner played down that idea, noting that the Obama administration was already pushing an overhaul of financial market rules in Congress that would ensure that banks pay the costs of their failures in future from their own pocket.
“A day-by-day financial transaction tax is not something we are prepared to support,” Geithner said in an interview with Sky News. In his concluding press conference, Geithner was asked repeatedly to say why he opposed such a tax on banks and indicated he doubted its effectiveness.
“This idea (of a bank transaction tax) has been around for a long time…I think frankly the experiences are mixed,” he said, expressing an American view that there was no widespread backing for such a tax.
Canadian Finance Minister Jim Flaherty was similarly skeptical.
“It’s one of the ideas that’s on the table, but is not particularly attractive to me as finance minister of Canada. We have been a government that has been reducing taxes,” Flaherty said.
ON DANGEROUS GROUND
Geithner’s key message was that recovery still remains on perilous ground and that it was too soon to discuss the timing for removing the massive fiscal and monetary stimulus that countries around the world have poured into their economies.
“Government policy has to provide a bridge to growth led by the private sector,” he said. “We’re now in the middle span of that bridge.”
That meant policymakers must move cautiously in trying to bring down huge budget deficits without choking off chances for growth led by consumer spending and business investment.
“If we put the brakes on too quickly we will weaken the economy and the financial system, unemployment will rise, more businesses will fail, budget deficits will rise, and the ultimate cost of the crisis will be greater,” Geithner said.
“It’s too early to start to lean against recovery.”
The Federal Reserve on Wednesday is expected to reaffirm its intention to keep U.S. interest rates at ultra-low levels for a long time to support the economy, even as signs of recovery accumulate.
The U.S. central bank cut overnight rates close to zero percent last December and it has vowed to keep them there for an “extended period.” While some analysts think the Fed could start to tip-toe away from that pledge, most say it is too soon.
“Once they start removing that, that’s a real sign that they intend, within six months, to start raising rates,” said Deutsche Bank economist Torsten Slok. “But it’s just premature, looking at the economic numbers, to arrive at that conclusion.”
The Fed will issue a statement around 2:15 p.m. EST at the conclusion of its two-day policy meeting on Wednesday. Analysts expect the Fed to nod to modestly encouraging signs suggesting the economy is gaining strength, but still expect a cautious tone on policy.
Policy makers will need to take into account the economy’s faster-than-expected 3.5 percent annualized growth rate in the third quarter, which effectively signaled the end of the most painful recession since the 1930s. Suggesting further momentum, data on Monday showed manufacturing activity hit its highest level in 3-1/2 years last month.
Improved third-quarter corporate earnings have also fed optimism that the upturn can be sustained next year even after government help has dried up.
In an act underlining rising confidence in the recovery, billionaire investor Warren Buffet on Tuesday said his company, Berkshire Hathaway Inc, agreed to purchase the nation’s largest rail company, saying it is poised to benefit from the recovery.
Fed officials in recent weeks, however, have sent the message that while the outlook has improved, the recovery is likely to be sluggish and needs continuing support.
Unemployment is expected to climb above 10 percent before the labor market improves, damping the consumer spending that accounts for around 70 percent of U.S. output. The banking system is still under pressure from loan losses, and credit remains tight.
“We have to think about our exit policy and are looking at it very carefully, but at the moment, that’s not our first order concern. At the moment, it’s policy accommodation,” Chicago Federal Reserve Bank President Charles Evans, a voter on the Fed’s policy-setting panel, said on October 22.
Other central banks are also wrestling with how best to spur growth and when to withdraw extraordinary measures to support their economies.
The European Central Bank is expected to keep rates on hold at a record-low 1 percent on Thursday, while there is a good chance the Bank of England will expand its large asset purchase program at a meeting the same day.
Most analysts at top U.S. banks expect the Fed to keep interest rates on hold until mid-2010 or later, although interest rate futures markets are pricing in an increase earlier in 2010.
(Editing by Leslie Adler)
Health insurer WellPoint Inc is weighing more job cuts as it grapples with enrollment declines stemming from the weak U.S. economy, and looks to operate more efficiently next year.
WellPoint Chief Executive Officer Angela Braly said enrollment is not expected to increase in 2010, following significant declines this year, according to an internal company memo obtained by Reuters.
WellPoint, the largest U.S. health insurer by membership, has seen its enrollment pressured as its employer customers lay off workers. It previously said it would struggle to increase profits next year.
In the memo to WellPoint managers, Braly said the company periodically needs to adjust its size to align with membership and that it planned “to make these reductions thoughtfully and respectfully, but with appropriate speed.
“Discretionary spending, of course, will get special scrutiny, but staffing levels also must decline if we are to succeed in these tough economic times.”
A company spokeswoman, Kristin Binns, told Reuters the company reviews the size and skills of its workforce as the economic environment changes.
“We are examining ways we can operate more efficiently in 2010, which we believe is essential to allow us to invest for the longer term and to innovate for the benefit of our customers and members,” Binns said.
The memo did not specify how many job cuts WellPoint was considering and Binns did not elaborate. WellPoint employs about 42,000 workers.
In addition to possible job cuts, Braly in the memo said she asked her executive leadership team to examine the company’s structure.
Braly also said internal initiatives designed to improve efficiency, such as how the company processes claims and operates call centers, would produce “measurable results” as soon as 2010. WellPoint is also planning a broader push to use technology to improve its business, the memo said.
The Indianapolis-based company had said in January that it would eliminate about 1,500 positions, following large rivals that also had cut jobs in the face of the weakening economy.
In July, WellPoint projected it would end 2009 with about 33.6 million members, which would be a decline of about 1.4 million, or 4 percent, from the end of 2008.
Second-quarter results topped analysts’ estimates, but the company did not raise its 2009 profit forecast.
Chief Financial Officer Wayne DeVeydt told analysts on the company’s second-quarter conference call in July that he “would not expect operating earnings growth next year in this environment.”
High unemployment along with slimmer margins with Medicare Advantage plans for the elderly are likely to weigh on earnings, the company said then.
St. Louis’ economy shrank faster than almost any other region in the country in the second quarter, according to a new report out today from the Brookings Institution.
Only beleaguered Detroit saw its economic output fall faster than St. Louis’ in the three months ending in June, a time when Chrysler’s Fenton truck plant limped into shutdown and U.S. Steel’s massive Granite City Works sat quiet.
Those sort of cuts contrasted with a relatively stable housing sector and a job market that’s less gruesome than some, keeping St. Louis mired in the middle of the pack among 100 large metropolitan areas that Brookings has been tracking through the recession. It’s better off than housing crisis hot spots like Las Vegas or factory towns like Dayton, Ohio, but worse off than energy hubs in Houston and Dallas, the same as it was three months ago.
With its broad base of industries, St. Louis’ $120 billion regional economy tends to track the nation as a whole. But this spring’s factory cuts took an outsized toll here because they eliminated jobs with better-than-average wages, said Jason Kunkel, an economist who tracks St. Louis for Moody’s Economy.com. That translated into a 1.5 percent decline in output, though that figure may be revised upward a bit. Since the recession began, output is off 6.1 percent.
"The manufacturing sector there has been hit very hard," he said. "That certainly has a big effect on why (output) in the first half of 2009 will be worse than average."
The good news, said Howard Wial, who co-authored the Brookings report, is that things appear to be getting a little better. The pace of job cuts is slowing. Auto sales have leveled off, a good sign for the car-making that remains here. The big plant in Granite City is pumping out steel again.
"You can see the light at the end of the tunnel," he said. "But you’re not there yet."
The nation’s economy started to turn around after the passage of President Obama’s $787 billion stimulus package in February, his chief economic adviser said Thursday.
The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act created or saved slightly more than 1 million jobs through August, according to the president’s Council of Economic Advisers.
The stimulus plan also boosted the nation’s gross domestic product by 2.3 percentage points in the second quarter, the council said in its first quarterly stimulus report to Congress.
"We have absolutely seen a change in trajectory," said Christine Romer, the council’s chairwoman. "An economy that was in free fall with a tremendous amount of downward momentum has certainly seen something very different."
Not everyone, however, is buying that stimulus is helping improve the country’s fiscal picture.
"The White House can concoct whatever number they want, but the reality is 3 million American jobs have been lost since the start of the year and the unemployment number continues to rise," said Dave Camp, R-Mich., top Republican on the House Ways and Means Committee.
Stimulus on the streets
The federal government distributed $151.4 billion in stimulus funds or tax relief by the end of August. Another $128.2 billion was made available for recipients to claim. Much of the money spent went to individual tax cuts, state fiscal relief and aid to the most vulnerable.
Economists have differed over whether the stimulus package indeed improved economic activity in the second quarter, though most say it will have an impact in the current period. The GDP contracted at an annual rate of 1% in the second quarter, a significantly slower decline than in the previous two periods.
The latest Blue Chip consensus economic forecast for the third quarter is a 3% expansion, Romer said. Stimulus spending accounts for 2.7% of that bump.
The unemployment rate, however, remains a weak point in the Obama administration’s portrayal of stimulus gains totally free credit score. The rate continues to increase, rising to 9.7% in August, though the pace of job loss has moderated. Congressional Republicans are pointing to the rising rate as evidence that the stimulus package is a failure.
"The Democrats’ bloated ’stimulus’ isn’t working, and we can’t afford another trillion-dollar mistake on the backs of our children and small businesses," said Rep. John Boehner, R-Ohio, after the latest job figures were released Friday.
The return to job growth depends on private industry, said Romer, adding the recovery act is still on track to save or create 3.5 million jobs.
"One of the big issues is, does the private sector come back?" Romer said.
So far, stimulus funding has helped boost employment in manufacturing, construction, retail trade and temporary employment services, the council said.
The administration has been on the defensive lately when it comes to the recovery act. Last week, Vice President Joe Biden gave a lengthy speech detailing how the stimulus package is meeting its goals to pull the country out of its economic doldrums.
"Two hundred days in, the recovery act is doing more, faster and more efficiently and more effectively than most people expected," Biden said.
Still, even some of the president’s supporters say more needs to be done to help Americans during the recession.
Sen. Joe Lieberman, I-Conn., called on the administration on Wednesday to speed up the pace of stimulus spending, particularly on construction jobs.
"We must do everything possible to put those and all stimulus dollars to work as quickly as possible to blunt the heavy toll the recession continues to take on far too many of our citizens," Lieberman said.
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