Thaindian News

WASHINGTON, D.C. (BNO NEWS) — One of President Obama’s economic advisers on Wednesday said the U.S. unemployment rate looks stable, while White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs defended the stimulus bill on his Twitter account.

White House economic adviser Christina Romer made the comments during an interview on ABC News’ Good Morning America. Romer said the national employment picture looked stable, and expects a continued job growth by spring.

“Right now, the employment numbers look basically stable,” Romer said. “We think we’re going to see positive job growth by spring.”

Also on Wednesday, White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs - who recently joined the social networking website Twitter - commented on a New York Times story that defended the stimulus bill passed by Congress last year.

The New York Times story, which was written by Times reporter David Leonhardt, said that the bill - according to estimates - added some 1.6 million to 1.8 million jobs. Although the White House had initially said it would add up to two million jobs, the ultimate impact of the bill is expected to be roughly 2.5 million jobs - better than expected.

“Of all the Recovery Act news today[,] read this and imagine ’something like 2 million’ more who’d be unemployed right now,” Gibbs wrote, while referring to the New York Times story.

The comments came after the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics released its employment situation summary earlier this month, which showed that the national unemployment rate fell from 10.0 percent to 9.7 percent in January.