Press Releases

The U.S. Department of Labor announced this morning that 20,000 jobs were lost in January while the national unemployment rate, which counts only those Americans actively looking for work, fell to 9.7 percent. At the same time, the job losses for the month of December were revised upward to show a loss of 150,000 jobs, rather than the 85,000 originally reported. Rep. John Kline (R-MN), the Senior Republican on the U.S. House Education and Labor Committee, issued the following statement:

“Nearly one year ago, the Obama Administration and Democrats in Congress promised their so-called ‘stimulus’ package would immediately jumpstart job creation and keep unemployment from exceeding 8 percent. Despite an $862 billion price tag, America has lost 3 million jobs, leaving taxpayers to continue to ask, ‘Where are the jobs?’

“While we are all heartened to see a downward trend in the unemployment rate, this lower figure likely represents an increase in the number of Americans who have grown so discouraged by this economy that they have stopped looking for work altogether.

“President Obama pledged to make jobs his number one focus in 2010. To do so, he and his allies in Congress need to immediately acknowledge the failure of their government expansion experiment and abandon the job-killing agenda that has created so much economic uncertainty. The American economy can recover, but it will be in spite of the Democrats’ big government, special interest policies – not because of them.”

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