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WASHINGTON: President Barack Obama said he was confident the US economy would recover, despite new data showing unemployment at a 26-year-high of 9.5 per cent, which dampened hopes of a quick rebound.
Obama said the latest jobless figures, revealing the economy shed 467,000 jobs last month, were "sobering" but insisted there were signs that the recession was slowing after the worst slump since the 1930s Great Depression.
"As I've said from the moment I walked into the door of this White House, it took years for us to get into this mess and will take us more than a few months to turn this around," Obama said.
The president spoke after meeting a group of CEOs of what he described as the "most innovative energy companies in America" to talk about a sector he says is vital to hauling the country out of its deepest recession in decades.
"I'm absolutely confident that we can, at this period of difficulty, prove, once again, what this nation can achieve when challenged," Obama said.
"I'm confident that we're not only going to recover from this recession in the short term, but we're going to prosper in the long term."
Future growth, Obama argued, had to be built on new economic foundations - which include alternative energy - and he highlighted historic climate change legislation passed last week by the House of Representatives.
The bill, which faces a tough ride in the Senate, includes incentives for the development of alternative energy, which Obama has made a keynote policy goal of his administration.
"Now it's up to the Senate to continue the work that was begun in the House to forge this more prosperous future.
"We're going to need to set aside the posturing and the politics, and when we put aside the old ideological debates, then our choice is clear."
The Labour Department report, seen as one of the best indicators of economic momentum, reversed the improvement seen last month when job losses fell to a revised 322,000.
Since the recession began in December 2007, the world's biggest economy has lost 6.5 million jobs and the jobless rate has risen 4.6 percentage points.
Obama said last month that unemployment may rise above 10 per cent before the economy stabilises.
Taking office in the grip of economic blight at the end of January, Obama quickly passed a US$787-billion economic stimulus bill and has presided over sweeping banking, mortgage and regulatory reform.
White House spokesman Robert Gibbs on Thursday denied that the figures showed the stimulus plan was not working.
"There is a sense that the beginnings of stabilisation are taking hold," he said, adding "there's obviously evidence that the recovery plan is working."
Senior White House officials have argued that the jobless picture would be even worse were it not for the job-creating impact of the stimulus plan.
- AFP/yb
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