President Obama Has Plan to Create New Jobs

The new president of the United States wants to use government money to put people to work. President Barack Obama says his plan will create three to four million jobs.

More than 90 percent of the new jobs would be in the private sector. That means the workers would not be government employees.

Obama wants Congress to approve laws that will allow him to spend money on the plan. The president is asking for permission to spend $825 billion. One billion dollars is one thousand million dollars.

The plan will mean better schools, the president said. It also will reduce electric bills. The plan also will improve health care.

Obama became president on January 20th. The first Saturday of his presidency was on January 24th.

On that day, Obama made his first radio and Internet speech to the nation as president. He talked for five minutes.

Obama said the nation€™s economy could fall $1 trillion short of its full capacity. A trillion dollars is one thousand times one billion dollars.

He said that equals more than $12,000 in lost income for a family of four people. A generation of young people could be forced to skip going to college or training for the jobs of the future, he said.

€œIn short, if we do not act boldly and swiftly, a bad situation could become dramatically worse,€� he said.

Obama wants both parties to support plan
Obama is seeking help from Democrats and Republicans for his plan. Obama is a Democrat. His party holds more than half of the seats in the Senate and more than half in the House of Representatives.

Members of political parties usually vote the same way as fellow members. In this case, Democrats can be expected to vote in favor of Obama€™s plan.

Republicans say they are worried that Obama will not spend the money fast enough. Obama says most of the money will be spent within 18 months.

Republicans also want to reduce taxes for every taxpayer. Obama would cut taxes for most people.  His plan would give a tax cut of $500 to every worker for two years.

Obama will need to get approval for his plan from both houses of Congress. The Senate and the House of Representatives make up the two houses. The Senate is considered the upper body of Congress. It is considered to be more powerful. It also has fewer members.

The Senate has 100 Senators. The House has 435 members.

Obama wants to spend money to repair 10,000 school buildings. He says money also would improve learning for 5 million students.

The plan also would spend money on putting medical records on computers. That would make health care cheaper, the president said.

Another proposal is to spend money on preventing health problems. Healthy people can avoid higher spending on medical care.

Obama is hoping Congress will approve his plan by February 13th.

Details of the plan are available on the Internet at the following website: http://tinyurl.com/db83d8

Sources: Associated Press by Philip Elliot; Milwaukee Journal Sentinel with credits to New York Times and McClatchy News Service