Obama lays out initiative to relieve joblessness

WASHINGTON — President Barack Obama outlined major new government stimulus and jobs proposals today, saying the nation must continue to “spend our way out of this recession.”

Without giving a price tag, Obama proposed a package of new spending for highway, bridge and other infrastructure projects, deeper tax breaks for small businesses and tax incentives to encourage people to make their homes more energy efficient.

“We avoided the depression many feared,” Obama said in a speech at the Brookings Institution, a Washington think tank. But, he added, “Our work is far from done.”

For the third time in a week, Obama sought to focus on job creation, noting that the jobless rate continues in double digits and that “a staggering” 7 million Americans have lost jobs since the recession began in December 2007.

While his proposal did not include the kind of direct federal public works jobs that were created in the 1930s, he said government could set the stage for more job creation by private businesses.

Obama did not characterize his proposals as another stimulus program, like the $787 billion version passed earlier this year, Republican critics have called it just that and have said it will increase a federal deficit that is already at a record level.