美就业低迷 或促进预算谈判

SCOTT SIMON, host: This is WEEKEND EDITION from NPR News. I'm Scott Simon. The U.S. economy slammed on the brakes（踩急刹车） last month. A report from the Labor Department shows employers added just 18,000 jobs in June. That's even worse than the dismal numbers from the month before. Meanwhile, the unemployment rate rose to 9.2 percent.

This discouraging economic news adds another complication as President Barack Obama and congressional leaders try to make a deal to reduce the federal deficit. NPR's Scott Horsley reports.

SCOTT HORSLEY: It turns out that was no bump in the road the economy hit this spring. It was more like a concrete jersey barrier. Hiring came to a near standstill last month with paltry gains in the private sector almost completely offset by layoffs in the government. There wasn't a scrap of good news in the Labor Department's report from President Obama to seize on.

President BARACK OBAMA: Our economy as a whole just isn't producing nearly enough jobs for everybody who's looking.

HORSLEY: The slowdown marks a turn around. Earlier this year, employers were adding workers at a healthy clip of more than 200,000 each month. But since March more than half a million people have joined the ranks of the unemployed. And the unemployment rate has jumped by .4 of a percent.

Temporary services, which are often an early warning sign, cut 12,000 jobs last month. Tom Maher owns a manpower temporary firm in Dayton, Ohio.

TOM MAHER: Our best week was the very first week of March. And we saw steady growth all throughout that first quarter. When we got toward the last week of March and then starting into April is when we started to see a pretty big decline. And it happened pretty rapidly.

HORSLEY: Maher often supplies temporary workers to automakers and parts suppliers, many of whom are still recovering from the disruptions caused by the Japanese tsunami in mid-March. Last month, Maher says he had jobs for 15 percent fewer workers than at the same time last year.

MAHER: And it's not only the slowdown, but it seems like the optimism has been dissipating. People were very optimistic heading into the new year and things have definitely been tempered.

HORSLEY: Here in Washington, House Speaker John Boehner says the stagnant jobs picture adds urgency to the ongoing budget talks between lawmakers and the White House.

Representative JOHN BOEHNER: We have three really big problems. We have a spending problem. We have a debt problem. And we have a jobs problem. That's why I believe that it's important for us to fundamentally fix our spending problem and our debt problem and to help get our economy moving again.

HORSLEY: But in trying to solve the deficit problem, lawmakers run the risk of worsening unemployment. Economist Heather Boucher is with the Center for American Progress, a think tank friendly to the Obama administration. She argues cutting the deficit should take a backseat（次要位置） until more people are back at work.

HEATHER BOUCHER: This is not the right time to be cutting spending in the short term. Sharp spending cuts would have a negative impact on the job market.

HORSLEY: The federal government is no longer shoveling money into the economy as it was during the president's first two years in office. And there's no political appetite for another big stimulus program. Still, White House economic adviser Austan Goolsbee sees the disappointing jobs report in June as a call to action for policymakers.

AUSTAN GOOLSBEE: We want the private sector to be the primary engine of recovery, but Washington can take actions to help the private sector to stand up quicker.

HORSLEY: Goolsbee suggests an infrastructure bank to employ idle construction workers, building roads and bridges, as well as new trade agreements to boost American exports.

President Obama also called for an extension of the payroll tax cut, which is otherwise due to expire at the end of this year.

OBAMA: There're a lot of middle class families who sure could use the security of knowing that the tax cut that I signed in December to help boost the economy and put $1,000 in the pockets of American families that that's still going to be around next year. That's a change that we could make right now.

HORSLEY: Cutting payroll taxes is one flavor of economic stimulus that Republican lawmakers might go along with, even though in the short term it would make the deficit worse.

Tomorrow, President Obama sits down with congressional leaders to continue work on a deficit cutting plan. Many lawmakers see that plan as a prerequisite（先决条件） for raising the government's debt ceiling. Economy adviser Goolsbee says ending uncertainty about whether Washington will pay its debts would be another positive step.

GOOLSBEE: We have got to stop bickering（争吵） in Washington and do those things that we can agree on.

HORSLEY: These days that's a pretty short list.
Scott Horsley, NPR News, Washington.