Gene Sperling’s appointment as director of the National
Economic Council coincided with the release of the December jobs report that
showed the unemployment rate dropping to 9.4 percent, its lowest level in
nearly two years.
But job growth fell short of expectations, and Obama said
that Sperling, along with other newly appointed members of the economic team,
have a challenging task ahead.
“Our mission has to be to accelerate hiring and accelerate
growth,” Obama said during remarks at a window manufacturing plant in suburban
Maryland. “That depends on making our economy more competitive.” The head of
the US central bank, Federal Reserve chairman Ben Bernanke, also sketched a
more optimistic outlook for the US economy on Friday, but cautioned that it
would take time for the job market to improve.
Sperling, a counselor to Treasury Secretary Timothy
Geithner, is returning to a familiar role. He served as NEC director in Bill
Clinton’s administration, where he played a key role in the 1993 deficit
reduction bill and compromised with a Republican-led Congress on the 1997
balanced budget agreement.
“He’s a public servant who has devoted his life to making
this economy work - and making it work, specifically, for middle-class
families,” Obama said.
The role gives Sperling broad oversight of the
administration’s economic policies as the White House contends with near-double
digit unemployment and looming legislative battles on the budget and deficit
now that Republicans have taken control of the House of Representatives and cut
into Democrats’ majority in Senate.
Sperling takes over the council post from Lawrence Summers,
who left the White House last month to return to Harvard University.
Sperling has worked closely with the president and played a
key role in budget negotiations and the administration’s small business
initiatives. Administration officials say Sperling made a strong impression on
Obama last month when he helped secure a compromise with Republican lawmakers
on a tax cut deal.
Obama also nominated Katharine G. Abraham to his Council of
Economic Advisers and Heather Higginbottom as deputy director of the Office of
Management and Budget. Those two posts require Senate confirmation. Obama also
will elevate economic adviser Jason Furman to assistant to the president for
economic policy.
The president spoke at Thompson Creek Window Company in
Landover, Maryland, a family-owned business that the White House said took
advantage of an initiative in Obama’s tax compromise with Republicans that
allows businesses to expense 100 percent of their investments in 2011. The
president made a direct appeal to other companies, telling them now is the time
to capitalize on that opportunity.
“If you are planning or thinking about making investments
sometime in the future, make those investments now, and you’re going to make
money,” Obama said.
Friday’s personnel announcements came amid a wider White
House shakeup of top senior leadership. Obama named William Daley, a prominent
business executive, as his chief of staff Thursday; press secretary Robert
Gibbs is leaving the White House next month to become a paid consultant to
Obama’s re-election campaign; and senior adviser David Axelrod will head to
Chicago next month to lead the re-election campaign, with Obama’s former
campaign manager, David Plouffe, filling his role at the White House.
Sperling’s pragmatism and his work as a corporate
philanthropy consultant to Goldman Sachs, where he was paid more than $880,000,
has prompted some liberals to voice misgivings about his appointment. He helped
the investment bank design an initiative to provide business education to women
in developing countries. He also worked with actress Angelina Jolie to develop
education programs for children living in conflict-ridden countries.
“It’s hard for me to believe someone gives you $900,000 and
you don’t feel positively disposed toward them,” said Dean Baker, co-director
of the liberal Center for Economic and Policy Research.
But Robert Greenstein, executive director of the Center on
Budget and Policy Priorities, a liberal-leaning research group, defended
Sperling as an advocate of policies that help low- and moderate-income families
and especially children.
“That’s not exactly what comes to mind when this label gets
thrown around that he has ties to Wall Street,” Greenstein said.
