Biden also underscored the need to have a robust bill. « We can’t do too much here. We can do too little, » he said.
President Joe Biden on Friday used numbers from a recent jobs report that showed lower-than-expected employment figures to justify passage of a swift and robust COVID-19 economic stimulus package. While the unemployment rate dropped by 0.4 percent to 6.3 percent unemployed overall, much of that drop is attributable to the fact that people are leaving the labor force rather than finding new employment. Just 49,000 new jobs were created in January, with only 6,000 of those jobs coming from the private sector. Revisions to November and December jobs reports, too, demonstrated sharp declines. Speaking at the White House on Friday, Biden took note of the poor jobs numbers, especially those that were created within the private sector. “We saw the jobs report — only 6,000 private-sector jobs have been created. At that rate, it’s going to take 10 years before we get to full unemployment,” Biden said. “That’s not hyperbole. That’s a fact.” Recounting his experience with the 2009 stimulus package he helped negotiate as vice president under former President Barack Obama, Biden warned that this is not the moment to skimp. “We can’t do too much here. We can do too little,” he said. Biden was critical, too, of Republicans in Congress who want to scale back the economic stimulus package that he and Democrats are proposing, the price tag of which currently sits at $1.
