Obama Oversees Zero Job Growth During August, Black Unemployment Highest In 27 Years

It's on his watch so Barry's responsible, come 2012 it's time for another change:

August brought no increase in the number of jobs in the United States, a signal that the economy has stalled and that inaction by policy makers carries substantial risk.


The government report on hiring, released on Friday, prompted another round in a relentless diminution of economic expectations. The unemployment rate, at 9.1 percent, did not change last month, and the White House said it was expected to stay that high through at least 2012.


The optics of a giant zero in the jobs column — more symbolically powerful, perhaps, than even a small decrease might have been — increase the pressure on President Obama as he prepares to deliver a major address on job creation next week, on Republicans who have a starkly different approach to economic revival and on the Federal Reserve, whose policy makers have been divided over the wisdom of using its limited arsenal of tools to get the economy moving again.


The White House immediately seized on the report to bolster the president’s impending call to action. Republicans countered that the numbers were further proof that the stimulus policies of Mr. Obama, whom they quickly dubbed “President Zero,” were not working.


Mr. Obama, who instructed the Environmental Protection Agency on Friday to pull back on more stringent standards on ozone emissions in response to complaints that they would hurt hiring, is expected to propose tax incentives to promote hiring and infrastructure spending. He also is expected to renew the payroll tax cut and extend unemployment benefits, both of which are set to expire.


The Federal Reserve is expected to weigh whether to take steps to help lower long-term interest rates to bolster the economy at its two-day meeting this month.


The new data, a monthly snapshot from the Department of Labor, sent stocks sliding. The Dow Jones industrial average fell 253.31 points, 2.2 percent, Friday, closing at 11,240.26.


Some economists said the possibility of a double-dip recession was increasing.


“As long as payrolls are weak, you will continue to hear cries of not just recession risk but cries that the United States is in a recession and we just don’t know it,” said Ellen Zentner, the senior United States economist for Nomura Securities.

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