Obama increases jobs goal to 3 million

ByABC News
December 21, 2008, 11:48 AM

WASHINGTON -- President-elect Barack Obama has increased his employment goal with the nation's economic outlook worsening, seeking to create or save 3 million jobs in the next two years instead of the 2.5 million he proposed last month.

Obama set the more ambitious target earlier this week after meeting with top economic advisers who cautioned that the nation's unemployment rate could exceed 9% given the current pace of job losses, Obama transition officials said Saturday.

During the presidential campaign, Obama pledged to create or save 1 million jobs. He increased that goal to 2.5 million over two years just last month.

Obama and his family traveled Saturday to his home state of Hawaii for a two-week vacation. But advisers were using Obama's guidance as a roadmap for a draft stimulus package to have ready when he returns on Jan. 2, advisers said.

Obama met with Vice President-elect Joe Biden and his economic leadership team Tuesday in Chicago.

Transition officials said Christina Romer, an economics professor who Obama has chosen as chair of his Council of Economic Advisers, opened the meeting by arguing that historical data and wide-ranging expert opinions suggest that upcoming economic problems could be more severe than anything the country has faced over the past half century. She said the country is likely to lose another 3 million to 4 million jobs over the next year without significant action.

Biden and Obama responded by pushing for a more ambitious jobs plan, driven by federal investments in health care, education and energy that could have a stimulative effect and lay the ground work for long term reform and a more sustainable economy. Ideas included weatherizing 1 million homes, shifting to a paperless health system, investing in disease prevention and modernizing schools.

Obama's team and congressional staff over the last week have been scrambling to come up with details of a plan to pump up the droopy economy with $650 billion or more in government spending over the next few years.