May Job Report: Unemployment Increases as Hiring Slows

Press Release

Congressman calls on President, Senate to engage on pro-jobs, pro-growth agenda

After several months of promising economic indicators, the May jobs report released by the U.S. Department of Labor could indicate a weakening of the nation's struggling economic recovery. Employers added just 54,000 -- less than one-third of the anticipated 175,000 and the weakest jobs report since September.

Congressman Jack Kingston (R-GA) cited the report as the latest evidence that President Obama and Senate Democrats need to quit stalling on pro-growth and pro-jobs policies.

"The jobless rate in this country is unacceptable," said Kingston. "At what point will President Obama and Senate Democrats abandon their failed economic policies and engage in a meaningful agenda to put Americans back to work? If government spending were the answer, we would be on easy street. It is not and, in fact, spending is part of the problem. Let's roll up our sleeves and work on real solutions to empower job creators to do what they do best: grow the economy."

The bleak report comes on the heels of several other indicators out this week which put the nation's economic recovery into question. Other reports this week suggested declines in consumer spending and the manufacturing sectors and continued stagnation in the housing market.

The rate of job creation in May was too low to keep up standard growth. The economy must create 125,000 new jobs each month just to accommodate new job seekers.

House Republicans formalized a comprehensive plan for America's job creators which focuses on empowering families, small business and entrepreneurs. Under the plan, Congress would work to ease the regulatory burden on small businesses and require congressional approval of any new regulation that would significantly impact the economy.

The blueprint would provide for tax simplification and a 25 percent cap on the federal tax rate for businesses and individuals. It would increase competitiveness for American manufacturers by passing pending free trade agreements with Colombia, Panama and South Korea. The plan calls for increased American energy production by removing the Obama Administration's de facto moratorium on exploration and production.

House Republicans would focus extensively on encouraging entrepreneurship through a series of measures including addressing the backlog in patent applications, expediting the visa application process for highly-skilled workers and reforming the process by which the Food and Drug Administration approves medications and medical devices.

The plan also calls for government to live within its means and to address the federal debt by reducing annual deficits, a cause of which Kingston has long been a champion.

"Our debt is unsustainable and is an increasingly deadly weight on our economy," Kingston said. "It causes uncertainty to job creators and diverts precious resources to paying our nation's creditors. Any meaningful plan to create jobs must include reforms that will change our fiscal trajectory and pay down the national debt. Our children and grandchildren will not know the America in which we grew up if this generation leaves them with mountains of debt."

That position was echoed by more than 150 economists who this week signed a statement that any increase in the nation's statutory debt limit that is not accompanied by significant spending cuts and budget reforms will hire private-sector job creation.

Two of the nation's leading credit ratings agencies, Moody's and Standard and Poor's, have both indicated that a failure to address the nation's ballooning debt would hurt the nation's economic standing and increase the cost of doing business in America.

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