>> thank you. [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2012] >> tonight on c-span, several programs looking at the january unemployment numbers. first remarks from president obama. after the response from republican leaders. a joint hearing focusing on the economic report. the u.s. labor department reported that 243,000 new jobs were added in january, dropping the nation's unemployment rate to 8.3%. now, remarks from president

obama on that report. he also unveiled his veteran jobs plan. the president spoke at veirs station no. 5 in arlington, virginia -- fire station no. 5 in arlington, virginia. this is about 20 minutes. [applause] >> thank you. thank you. thank you guys. thank you so much. everybody, please have a seat. well, good morning, everybody. >> good morning. >> jacob, thank you for that introduction. more importantly, thank you for your extraordinary service to our country. i want to acknowledge two outstanding members of my cabinet who are here today -- the secretary of veterans affairs is in the house. also one of our finest --

himself one of our finest veterans. obviously, an extraordinary leader when he was in our army. i also want to of knowledge interior secretary ken salazar, who is in the house. [applause] and we are joined by another president. the international association of firefighters president is here. [applause] this is a fire station that holds some special significance for our country. on september 11, the firefighters of this house were among the first to respond to the attack on the pentagon. you guys answered this nation's call during its hour of need. in the years that followed, as americans went to war, some of

you answered that call as well. generation of9/11 veterans has already earned a special place in our history. our veterans and all brave men and women who served our country are the reason why america's military is the greatest in the history of the world. in the face of great odds and grave danger, they get the job done. they worked as a team. they personify the very best that america has to offer. that is true on the battlefront, but we are here today because it is also true on the home front. after a decade of war, our nation needs to do some building right here in the united states of america. this morning, we received more good news about our economy.

in january, american businesses added another 257,000 jobs. the unemployment rate came down because more people found work. altogether, we have added 3.7 million new jobs over the last 12 months. these numbers will go up and down in the coming months, and there are still far too many americans who need a job or need a job that pays better than the one they have now, but the economy is growing stronger. the recovery is speeding up. we've got to do everything in our power to keep it going. we cannot go back to the policies that led to the recession, and we cannot let washington stand in the way of our recovery. we want washington to be helping with the recovery, not making it

tougher. the most important thing congress needs to do right now is to stop taxes from going about 160 million americans at the end of this month. they have to renew the payroll tax cut that extended only for a couple of months. they need to pass an extension of the payroll tax cut and unemployment insurance and do it without drama, without delay, without linking it to some ideological side issue. they just need to get it done. should not be that complicated. now was not the time for self- inflicted wounds to our economy. now was the time for action. i want to send a clear message to congress -- do not slowed down the recovery that we are on. do not muck it up. keep it moving in the right direction. [applause] beyond preventing a tax hike, we

need to do more a lot -- we did a lot more to create an economy that is built to last -- restore american manufacturing. we need to stop giving tax breaks to companies that ship jobs overseas. give those tax breaks to companies that are investing in plant and equipment and hiring workers right here in america. that makes a lot of sense. to reduce our dependence on foreign oil, we need to stop subsidizing oil companies that are already making record profits and double down on clean energy that creates jobs and creates opportunities in new industries but also improves our security because we are not as dependent on foreign oil. to make sure our businesses do not have to move overseas to find skilled workers, we have got to invest in education and make sure college is affordable for every hardworking american. and this is the reason we are here today -- we need to make sure that as our troops return

from battle, they can find a job when they get home. that is what i want to talk about today. [applause] the war in iraq is over. the war in afghanistan is moving to a new phase. we are transitioning the afghan lead. over the past decade, nearly 3 million service members have transition back to civilian life, and more are joining them every day. when these men and women come home, they bring unparalleled skills and experience. folks like jacob -- they have saved lives in some of the toughest conditions imaginable. they have managed convoys and moved tons of equipment over dangerous terrain. they have tracked millions of dollars of military assets. they have handled pieces of equipment that are worth tens of

millions of dollars. they do incredible work. nobody is more skilled, more precise, more diligent, more disciplined. our veterans are some of the most highly trained, highly educated, highly skilled workers that we have got. these are americans that every business should be competing to attract. these are americans we want to keep serving here at home as we rebuild this country. so we are going to do everything we can to make sure that when our troops come home, they come home to new jobs and new opportunities and new ways to serve their country. this has been a top priority of mine since i came into office. already, we have helped 600,000 veterans and their family members go back to school on post-911 gi bill. we have hired over 120,000

veterans to serve in the federal government. we have made it easier for veterans to access all sorts of employment services. we have set up online tools to connect veterans with job openings that match their skills. michelle and joe biden have worked with the private sector with businesses to secure a pledge of 135,000 jobs for veterans and their families. and with the support of democrats and republicans, we put in place two new tax credits for companies that hire veterans. but these are all important steps. we have made progress. but we have got to do more. there is more we can do. in my state of the union address, and propose a new initiative called the veteran's job corps to put veterans back to work protecting and rebuilding america. today, we are laying out the details of this proposal.

it is not that easy these days to get a job at a firehouse. over the past few years, tight budgets have forced a lot of states and a lot of communities to lay off a lot of first responders. my administration, when i first came to office, one of the first things we did was through the recovery act make sure that the government help or got the help they needed to prevent some of these layoffs, and thousands of jobs were saved all across the country. harold and i were talking as we came over here. thousands of firefighter jobs were saved because of the actions we took, but budgets are still tight, and that is a

problem we need to face. jobs that protect our families and our communities should not be the first on the chopping block. they should be one of our highest priorities as a nation. over the past three years, my administration has made it possible for states to keep thousands of first responders on the job, but today, we are announcing that communities to make it a priority to recruit veterans will be among the first in line when it comes to getting help from the federal government. i know that is one of the things, chief, that you have been doing here in arlington. so we want to prioritize veterans, and we want to help hire veterans to fire houses all across the country. the second thing we want to do is to connect to 20,000 veterans with jobs that involve rebuilding local communities or national parks. that is why ken salazar is here

as the interior secretary. he needs some help, and our veterans are highly qualified to help. they have already risked their lives defending america. they should have the opportunity to rebuild america. we have roads and bridges in and around our national parks in need of repair. let's fix them. of course, congress needs to fund these projects. congress needs to take money which are no longer spending on war and use it to do some nation-building here at home to a improve the quality of life right here in the united states of america and put our veterans to work. [applause] more cops on the beach and get more rangers in the parks. let's get more firefighters on the call, and in the process, we're going to put more veterans back to work. it is good for our communities. it is good for our economy, and it is good for our country.

for veterans who want to do something else -- maybe put their leadership skills to use starting a small business -- we are going to start offering entrepreneurial training to our veterans. we want service members prepared for battle and for professional success when they come home, so we should do all that we can to support our troops and our veterans in helping them start a business, helping them get a foothold in a fire station like this one, and start moving up the ranks, doing outstanding work the way jacob has been doing. but we also need to follow their lead. we want to help them, but we should also learn from them. and we should remember from our veterans that no matter what the circumstances, those men and women in uniform, a lot like the firefighters in this fire station, work together. act as a team.

finish the job. that is what we have got to do when it comes to our nation's recovery. these are challenging times for america, but we have based challenging times before. on the grounds here, you have a stone from the pentagon and a beam from the world trade center. that reminds us of our resolve as a people. they remind us that when we come together as one people and one community, one nation, then we prevail. that is who we are. this is a nation that exists because generations of american work to build it. a nation where out of many, we come together as one. those are the values that every veteran understands. those are values that this fire station understands. we have got to make sure that we return to those values. we do, then i guarantee you we will remind everybody around the

world just why it is the united states is the greatest country on earth. thank you very much, everybody. god bless america. [applause] c-s [captioning performed by national captioning institute] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2012]

[applause] >> now, house republican leaders respond to the january unemployment numbers. this is about 20 minutes.

>> good morning, everyone. i am sure you are surprised to see me be first. we are going to shake things up a little bit. i am going to talk to you about the american energy and infrastructure jobs act, which has been coming together on the house side this week. we had three bills that came through the natural resources committee, which i sent out, and these are just common sense bills, as far as i'm concerned. it is a long ways to get anywhere in south dakota. you have families that are hard- working taxpayers, doing their job trying to stretch their dollars, but they need to pay for gasoline to drive. they need to pay for diesel fuel, pay for energy to heat their homes. that is what these bills are going to do. they're going to solve two problems at once. not only deal with our infrastructure needs we have in this country, but there will also lower infrastructure costs as well. just common sense. by accessing some of the offshore drilling resources we have, by utilizing our oil shale

resources, and really making sure that we can use other resources that are available to us that have been shut off by this administration, such as the keystone pipeline. those make sense to everyday americans, for hard-working taxpayers that really want to get things done. the benefits are -- it is going to create some jobs and drive down energy costs and give them consistency in this economy, which we have been lacking since this administration is taking office. let me tell you -- gas prices have doubled since this president has gone into office, and it is a tragic shame for people really struggling through this tough economy. for me, the overspending has to stop. but also, we can do a lot to fix our funding issues and drive down these costs. what is so unique about these bills that are going to come to gather as our transportation bill is that there are not going to be any earmarks attached. there will be no more borrowed stimulus dollars when it comes to a transportation bill. i hope when you are writing about these bills that that is

what you will focus on because this is fundamental reform that is going to be great for america. >> good morning. i am from texas 17. the president's team is going to try out their happy faces today, but the american people are going to say, "not so fast." first of all, we still feel worse than we did four years ago. we still have 5 million more americans that are unemployed than we did a year ago. the economy is still underperforming what it could. if this economy were performing the way it did in the reagan recovery, according to an article in the "wall street journal," we would have 17 million more americans working today than we do right now. if the reagan recovery model was followed, we would have almost $5,700 per capita in greater gdp than we have today. the president's policies have failed. they are holding back this economic recovery, and instead of trying to focus on real-world

solutions like these in the gop jobs plan, which is bipartisan, that has stepped up in the senate, he is relying on the politics of envy and division. i started a company in late 2005, and that company was sold early last year. if i sat down to start that company to, i would not, and i would not do it because of the uncertainty of this president's policies. i do not know what my taxes are going to be this time next year. i do not know what new regulation is going to get in my way. i do not know the next keystone that is going to be killed. i do not know the next waste of taxpayer dollars, and because of that, i am going to sit and wait until the president starts paying attention to real-world solutions to put americans back to work. thank you. >> good morning. it was three years ago this month that president obama came to congress and said, "you must

pass my stimulus package." it was a $787 billion -- $787 billion program, and at that time, he promised america that if we pass that plan, unemployment would not exceed 8%. we know this is the 36 month in a row that that 8% has been exceeded. yet, i did not have to be this way. there's another approach we could have taken, and bill pointed to it. president reagan took an approach focused on pro-growth, free-market solutions, and i think it is important to remember that president reagan actually had a more difficult, deeper recession. unemployment was higher. the inflation was rampant, and yet, he took an approach that in the third year of his term results in the economy booming by then. president obama has taken over by then. if anything, they make it worse.

house republicans are looking forward to a pro-growth agenda, a jobs package that would get people back to work and get americans back to work. >> on monday, the american people were reminded again that this president's policies have failed. when the congressional budget announced that this president is on track to deliver a $1 trillion-plus deficit every single year he is in office. today is an indication of another failure of this president's policies -- 36 months in a row of 8%-plus unemployment. we are all encouraged that the unemployment rate has come down, but again, as my colleague said, we were told that if we passed the president's stimulus plan, we would never see unemployment above 8%. by a technical definition of a

professional economist, this economy is in recovery. by historic standards, it is the slowest, weakest recovery in the post-depression era. and yet, there are millions of americans across this nation that do not feel the recovery. tell that to the one in seven under the president's policies that have to rely on food stamps. tell it to the 50% -- almost half of americans -- that according to the census bureau are now either low-income or in poverty. tell that to them that we have a great recovery. again, the president's policies have failed. it is one of the reasons that, regrettably, we see the politics of division and envy, but the american people do not want the division and a and b. they want more jobs. by any historic standard, as my colleagues in texas point out, had this recovery followed the pattern of other recoveries in the post-war era, the americans would have thousands of dollars more in their family budgets and

millions more would be employed. that is why i am is proud that once again, house republicans continued to pass a jobs bill. just this week, revealing once again a portion of the president's health care program, one of the greatest impediments to job growth to small business, ensuring that our congressional budget office will give us macro economic views of job impact statements. wasn't it interesting that after the president's health-care plan was passed that we finally got the report from the congressional budget office that it could cost us almost 1 million jobs? wonder what would have happened had that information been available to the american people ahead of time? another week, another indication of failed presidential policies, another week more republican jobs bills passed in the house. >> good morning. the jobs numbers today is

certainly welcome news. i think all of us want to see more americans get back to work, but as my colleagues have laid out, we could do a lot better. that is the kind of policies that we are talking about in our job creator plan. in fact, the president this week has indicated that perhaps he may now join us in focusing on the backbone of the american economy, which are the american small businesses. we know that every business at one point was a small business. small business start-ups and the number of jobs created are still woefully low. if we want to get more people back to work, if we want to reflect the kind of growth rate that we have seen in the reagan recovery and beyond, we can do that by focusing on small business, and we are going to bring a bill to the floor of the house prior to tax day, which provides small business a 20% tax cut. that is the kind of measure that will help inspire entrepreneurs,

small businessmen and women, to go ahead and invest and to create more jobs. they need a signal from washington that there is not an adversary here, that we believe in the aspirational sense of america. we believe in small business entrepreneurs. >> good morning, everyone. the american people have seen the same story now for 36 straight months. while there are flickers of hope in our recovery and certainly, they are welcome, but the american people were promised by the president that unemployment would not exceed 8%. and here we are, 36 straight months of unemployment over 8%. if you go back three years ago, when the president asked us to vote for a stimulus bill, they actually said that unemployment at this point would be at 6%. so while we welcome the positive news today, i think our point is very simple -- we can do better. the way we do better is for the senate to take up the 27 jobs

bills that are sitting in the united states senate. the president asked us to work with them. we have worked with him. all these bills he supports and his job council supports, and all of them have passed with bipartisan support in the house, so the president really wants to get the economy moving again, really wants to improve his own chances for reelection, maybe he will pick up the phone and call senator reid and ask senate democrats to get off their rear ends. >> tonight, our coverage on jan.'s unemployment numbers continues with the joint economic hearing. after that, republican presidential candidate mitt romney at a campaign event in nevada a day before the republican party caucuses in that state. later, a house energy and commerce subcommittee hearing on the keystone pipeline. >> senate, democratic congressional campaign committee chairman representative steve israel of new york on the strategy to win 25 more seats to

take control of the house of representatives this fall. that is at 10:00 a.m. at 6:00 p.m. eastern here on c-span, c- span radio, and c-span.org. >> nevada's gop caucuses are tomorrow. watch c-span's road to the white house coverage with the candidates' speeches live tomorrow night and throughout the day. fall line with live reports from the individual caucuses and their results tweeted by the nevada republican party that c- span.org/campaign2012 where you can also add your comments 3 c- span's facebook page. >> january's jobs report was also the focus of today's joint economic committee hearing. the report shows the unemployment rate dropped to 8.3%, and the economy added 243,000 jobs. earlier this week, the congressional budget office unveiled its 2012 economic outlook, which predicted unemployment will remain high and stay in the 8% range this

year. this is an hour and 15 minutes. >> good morning. chairman casey could not be here, and i am pleased to stand in for him this morning. i would like to welcome acting commissioner this morning as well as mr. thomas narden, acting assistant commissioner for employment and unemployment statistics, and the associate commissioner for prices and living conditions. want to make a couple of overall comments about the economic recovery before diving into this month employment numbers. in the second half of 2011, economic momentum picked up. the labor market continued to strengthen, adding 100,000 or more jobs for four straight

months. additionally, we learned last week that the gdp grew at a 2.8% annual rate in the fourth quarter, an improvement over the previous three quarters of 2011. though inventory rebuilding accounted for much of that growth. there are other encouraging signs. the manufacturing sector continues to show strength. the i s in manufacturing index reading of 54.1% in january marked the 30th consecutive month of expansion in the manufacturing sector, and the unemployment rate has been moving in the right direction. during 2011, the national unemployment rate fell from 9.4% to 8.5%. however, workers who had been out of work for long periods continue to struggle to find new jobs.

more than 42% of the unemployed have been jobless for six months or more. we need to help workers regain their footing and bolster the recovery by extending the payroll tax cut for the remainder of the year and continuing unemployment insurance for workers who are counting on these benefits to make ends meet. both of these policies put money in people's pockets, boosting demand, creating jobs, and strengthening our economy. as the january jobs report shows, we are making progress. as marked sandy said just this morning, this report was unambiguously positive -- as mark zandy said just this morning. but we must continue to invest in education infrastructure and our workers. we must also take on the housing crisis. without a smart, sensible path forward in housing, we simply cannot sustain this economic

recovery. today's unemployment report shows job gains. the economy added private-sector jobs for the 23rd straight month. during january, the economy gained 257,000 private-sector jobs. due to the loss of government jobs overall, the economy added 243,000 jobs during the month. the manufacturing sector, which added 237 jobs -- 237,000 jobs in 2011 gained in january, and that is always good news. in addition, the professional and business services sector added jobs and has not lost jobs since march 2010. employment in state and local governments was basically unchanged in january. in 2011, state and local governments shed 235,000 jobs

and continued face budget challenges that present a head wind for the economy. the overall unemployment rate was 8.3%. the lowest since february 2009. even with this progress, more than 12.7 million people are looking for work and simply cannot find it. the unemployment rate in the african-american community was 13.6%. among hispanic workers, the unemployment rate was 10.5%. while the overall unemployment rate for veterans was 7.5%. gulf war era veterans also faced an unemployment rate of 9.1%. today's employment report shows that the labor market continues to recover. the job gains in january continued the momentum from the fourth quarter of 2011. however, unemployment remains too high -- unacceptably high --

and we need to stay focused on creating jobs. the acting commissioner and i look forward to your testimony. now, it gives me pleasure to yield to mr. brady. >> thank you, chairman. commissioner, we welcome you in your new capacity to the joint economic community hearing -- committee hearing. we know you well. your parents at higher unemployment hearings and as a dedicated employee for many years -- we appreciate your service and look forward to your testimony. we also welcome members of your staff. these new jobs numbers are encouraging. long overdue but encouraging. the unemployment rate going down slightly is as well, but i have to caution you -- it masks the underlying weakness in our economy. fewer americans are actually participating in the workforce than in almost 20 years. the labor force participation rate at 63.7% has not been this

low since march of 1983. labor market simply is not recovering fast enough, considering especially how the -- how depressed it has been. by comparison, at this point, 31 months in the reagan recovery, we had already added 8.7 million new payroll jobs. today, however, the u.s. economy at best is uncertain, stopping in starts. we're still 6 million jobs short of what we were before the recession began. labor force participation, as i said, is the lowest in decades. , unemployment workers still account for more than 8% of this trucking workforce. whatever claims the president has made about how much worse recession has been, his policies have not stimulated the economy. we now have a huge federal debt, continuing large deficits, and again, stop and start on certain job growth. more than two and a half years have passed since the recession formally ended. yet, real gdp growth is expected

to decline this year from a less than stellar 2.8% fourth quarter of last year. the -- in contrast, we averaged over 6% economic growth during the first 10 quarters of the reagan recovery. business in america is still sorting cash. it still holds investments below what it was before the recession began, and it is still not materially stepping up hiring, despite what the new payroll jobs numbers say. consider the chart behind me. the top line -- the green line shows higher and the bottom line layoffs. huge turn in this chart is striking. over 4 million hires and 1.7 million layoffs, and image quite different from that of simply looking at net job changes. the key observation is that the hires still remain where it was during the middle of the recession. with all the money the white

house and members of congress have spent to stimulate employment, hires are still down about 1.5 billion per month from before the recession. in that light, the 242,000 payroll jobs gain today just are not that impressive. the magnitude of annual benchmark revisions, the most recent of which bls introduced, and today's report only underscores this problem. the low hires help to explain why labor force to dissipation is down. hiring has not risen in well over three years, with the huge pool of unemployed competing for jobs, then why stay in the labor force? they are simply dropping out. the unemployment rate and the payroll jobs numbers are important statistics, but they do not reveal the full extent of the problem that america faces. the president's current actions and proposals in my view our feeble attempts to lift a $15 trillion economy. with the equivalent of

matchsticks at the same time it is tightening regulations and imposing an avalanche of new regulation, thwarting the biggest show already projects, such as the keystone pipeline, threatens to raise taxes, all the while adding to our national debt would continue and disciplined deficit spending. strong private investment and job creation requires a balanced regulatory environment that actually encourages operation in the free market economy and a tax environment that engenders expansion, not retrenchments. the president is working against this free market economy with his policies, undermining it with subsidies and special favors in some areas and harshly constraining and punishing it in others. that will cause anemic growth, and this labor chart shows it. the slow economic growth will cause the unemployment rate to rise this year and next. the congressional budget office says the unemployment rate will hit 8.9% in the fourth quarter of this year and over 9% next.

americans are eager for work and willing to work hard. with these economic policies, our president has failed. we need a change in course. hard-working taxpayers deserve better, and the federal government needs to get out of the way so private job creation and hiring can take place. i look forward to hearing your testimony. yelled back. >> thank you very much. now, i yield to ms. maloney. >> first of all, congratulations on your interim appointment, and thank you for your many years of hard work for the joint economic committee and testimony. we welcome you. finally, we have continuing good news. for the fifth month, there has been a drop in the unemployment rate to 8.3%. for the 23rd month, we have been

gaining jobs to 243,000 jobs, so i fail to understand the doomsday testimony of my good friend, mr. brady. with unemployment numbers falling and the number of jobs -- job growth gaining, that shows that we are making steady progress in recovering from the great recession. still, we have much more work to do, including extending the payroll tax cut through all of 2012, which is a priority of president obama and democrats. i am hopeful the house will approve that before the current extension expires at the end of the month. i look forward to your testimony, and i hope it contains even more good news and these very encouraging numbers in unemployment and job growth. i yield back. >> thank you, mr. chairman.

and welcome to our committee and your staff. it goes without saying, we will all miss dr. hall. he certainly had a great deal of candor. he was the it could be of impartiality and non- partisanship in his office. i tried several times to bait him, but i was never successful. certainly look forward to your service here. the job numbers today -- good news. i almost feel like i am in a charles dickens novel. it is the best of times. that is the worst of times. the american economy is just had to keep down, no matter what the congress does to it, no matter what an administration does to it. the american economy has a unique and remarkable ability to recover. i know this having seen what happened to the economy -- i was in the private sector during the savings and loan crashed in taxes in the late 1980's. certainly no government action

seemed to be responsible for the recovery that eventually occur there, but it was a fairly strong recovery and lasted for the next 20, 25 years in the time of unparalleled prosperity in our state. our state continues to enjoy a significant prosperity. people with the taxes because of the lower regulation environment, the litigation environment, the lack of state income tax but to work state, and as a consequence, texas has added four new congressional districts, essentially a population the size of arkansas which has moved to texas in the last 10 years. it goes without saying that it is possible for the american public to do the right thing as far as job creation is concerned. it is not always possible for the government to do the right thing. i think i would argue -- i align myself obviously closer with mr. brady's, and stan chairwoman maloney's comments. but it is the private sector, the real folks out there who decide that they are going to create something of their own

and make it their own. that is what drives our economy. i really do not have a lot of faith in the ability of the administration. watching this committee for the last three years, hearing various people from the administration come in and testify, i cannot tell you the number of times we were told that the green shoots were sprouting and the economy was recovering, only to find that those were weeds proliferating in the parking lot because no one was showing up for work because there were no jobs. as far as the administration is concerned, we have examples of where they have had the ability to make decions and made the wrong decisions. chairman brady referenced the keystone pipeline. thousands of new jobs, and no government spending required at all. just simply an international boundary that was crossed, and therefore, the president's office was involved, and he made the wrong decision. the president is out even as we speak barnstorming around the country talking about how he is creating jobs, and here was

something at his fingertips that would have created thousands of jobs, no government spending involved, put people back to work and given them some jobs where they could have restored some dignity and self-worth, and he turned his back on it. we have other examples. maximum achievable control technology now affecting the boiler mackerels. air pollution rules were texas was included at the last minute with a group of northeastern states that there was no inclination prior to the issuance of the rules that the epa was even considering texas, and now we may be faced with having to close power plants and rolling brownouts during our hot summer months. the war on natural gas, which continues. let's face it -- domestic energy production is going to be part of this economic recovery, whether this administration likes it or not. it is high time that they stop interfering with that. ford will care act -- i mean, i could go on and on about just that and the chilling effect -- and i hear it when i go home. employer after employer says, "i do not know what is ahead.

i do not know what you're going to do next." people are so uncertain about what they will have to be providing in terms of employee benefits, but they are genuinely frightened to add that employee. the president goes around the country talking about his job proposals. let's let the private sector do what it does best. we are america. we have a history of doing this over and over again. we need to decrease government regulations, taxes, and left our economy grow. i have the utmost faith in the american people. i think with their left to their own devices, they can create jobs. i think whatever congress does is an impediment, and i know whenever the administration does is counterproductive. i look forward to your testimony today, and i'm certain we will learn a great deal. i yield back the balance of my time. >> thank you very much. i want to let mr. burgess and others know that just half an hour ago, on msnbc, mark zandy, -- one of his made

advisers -- said the business community is definitely starting to engage. again, he said when he looked at the report, it was unambiguously positive. ms. sanchez -- >> will someone yelled? >> go ahead. i was just going to make a point that he was 3 million jobs off in the first year of the stimulus estimation and has been consistently off. >> i would point out that the president's own jobs and economic council has besieged if the president to remove some of these regulations and allow things -- the cross-state air pollution law -- with something they distinctly referenced in the reports that have come before this committee. >> thank you. the fact is that we are going in the right direction. you would think that this was some domesday report. the fact is that we are going in the right direction, god. very briefly. >> you have to remember that when president obama took

office, this country was losing 700,000 jobs a month. the first four months before president obama took office, this country lost 4 million jobs. the president put in a recovery package that is moving us in the right direction. can we not at least agree that it is good news? that for five months, the unemployment has fallen and that for 23 months, we have been gaining jobs in this country. we should be pleased with this news. >> madam chairman, if i may, my only point -- i think ours -- is we do think these numbers are encouraging. our concern is the unemployment rate is going down because people are giving up because they are not getting jobs. we think that is the wrong reason. >> the unemployment rate is 8.3%. last month, it was 8.5%. ms. sanchez. >> thank you, mr. chairman. i do not have a statement. but i came this morning to try

to figure out where we really are and to get some ideas from people about how we continue the good trend that we have seen in these last five months with respect to unemployment going down. i really did not come here to hear a lot of political posturing and battle and everything, and i'm really struck by the fact that, you know, this committee cozy job, i think, is to really contemplate and think about -- this committee's job, i think, is to really complicate -- contemplated think about ideas for other legislative-writing committees to implement. you know, this going back and forth and this really degrading -- honestly, of this committee, is really a frustrating thing

for somebody who understands that when we see good numbers and that when people say economists -- all the economists this morning that i saw on television and in writing were saying, "this is good." let's just stop at this is good and what we can do to make it better. that is what this committee is charged with. i'm really looking forward to hearing from the gentleman before us to try to figure out where we go from here, how we go from here. how do we make this a positive thing for the american people? -- and my to hear friends on the other side -- >> if i may, i think you are right, and i do apologize -- >> the gentle lady has kind. >> thank you, mr. chairman. let's work together on this, guys. >> mr. campbell.

>> thank you very much for being here. we welcome you. >> mr. chairman and members of the committee, thank you for the warm welcome this morning and for the opportunity to discuss the employment and unemployment data that we released this morning. the unemployment rate decreased to 8.3% in january. than a little louder please. the green light should come on. >> there you go. >> the unemployment rate decreased in january, and non- farm on the planet to its rose. in 2011, non-farm employment increased by an average of 152,000 per month. job growth was widespread in the

private sector in january with the largest gains occurring in professional and business services, leisure and hospitality, and manufacturing. professional and business services added 70,000 jobs over the month, compared with an average monthly gain of 48,000 in 2011. nearly half of the january increase occurred in employment services, as temporary help of one of continued to trend up. also, employment rose in accounting and bookkeeping and in architectural and engineering services. employment in leisure and hospitality increased by 44,000, mostly in food services. health care employment rose by 31,000, with job gains in hospitals and ambulatory care services. implement of both wholesale and retail trades continued to trend up over the month. in the goods-producing sector, manufacturing employment increased by 50,000 in january. nearly all in durable goods

manufacturing. fabricated metal products, machinery, and motor vehicles each added jobs. over the past two months, construction employment rose by 52,000, mainly among non- residential specialty trade contractors. mining employment continued to expand in january since a recent low point in october 2009. mining has added 172,000 jobs. government employment was little changed in january. over the last 12 months, employment in this sector has decreased by 276,000 with declines in local government, state government, excluding education, and the u.s. postal service. average hourly earnings of all employees on private nonfarm payrolls increased by 4 cents in january. over the past 12 months, average hourly earnings have risen by 1.9%. from december 2010 to december

2011, the consumer price index for urban consumers increase. in accordance with annual practice, the establishment survey data released today reflecting corporation of benchmark revisions come each year, bls -re-anchors the sample base estimates primarily derived from administrative records of the unemployment insurance tax system here the level of non- farm payroll of london in march 2011 was revised up by 162,000 or about 0.1%. this compares to an average benchmark revision of plus or minus about 0.3%. before discussing the data from our survey of households, i would note that, as is our annual practice, we have incorporated a population controls into the january estimates. the beginning in january 2012

reflect population controls based on census 2010 as well as updated information on net international migration and adjustments in the estimation progress. official estimates for december 2011 and earlier months will not be revised to incorporate the census 2010 base controls. the impact of the new controls on the unemployment rate is negligible. however, two important household survey measures -- the employment population ratio, and the labor force participation rate -- are lower by the change in the composition of the population as seen in these new controls. the new controls raise the population of persons 55 years and older and, to a lesser extent, persons 16 to 24 years of age. both of these groups are less likely to be in the labor force than the general population. now returning to the data for january, the unemployment rate continued to decline of the month.

since august 2011, the jobless rate has fallen from 9.1% to 8.3%, and the number of unemployed persons has declined by about 1.2 million. -january, the number of persons unemployed for 27 weeks or more was little changed at 5.5 million and made up 42.9% of the total. the employment population ratio increased over the month, and the labor force participation rate was unchanged after accounting for the impact of the census 2010 base population controls. to summarize, january's labor market developments, non-farm payroll employment increased by 243,000, and the unemployment rate decreased to 8.3%. my colleagues and i now would be glad to answer your questions. >> thank you very much. i want you to clarify one point -- how much of the drop in the

unemployment rate in january was due to people finding jobs and how much was due to people dropping out of the labor force? >> the level of unemployment was down about 381,000 in january. over these five months since august, while it has been declining, the unemployment rate has declining, the level of unemployment is down about 1.2 million. so over that period the survey is up about 1.2 million so the numbers add up to a story of the unemployed finding jobs over the five-month period. the labor force has risen a little bit. >> the economic momentum that has occurred over the past few months seems to have carried into the labor market in addition to the 100,000-plus jobs being created each month, weekly applications for initial unemployment benefits physical

last week to 347,000 and remained below 400,000 for 10 of the last 12 weeks. furthermore, unemployment rate fell to 8.3%, lowest since february 2009. however, some observers have raised concerns that the improved numbers are a blip, are a reflection of the increased hiring that always occurs during the winter holidays or in the case of unemployment rate, it is a reflection of reduced labor force participation. commissioner, what in your perspective regarding the accuracy of the positive job creation numbers and extent to which they are attributable to the winter holiday shopping season or other factors? >> i'm confident in the accuracy of the numbers this month and every month. we adjust the numbers to remove

recurring seasonal variation from things like christmas time hiring. >> now, overall unemployment rate has fallen. are all demographic groups facing lower unemployment rates, in particular how are african-american teenagers doing, hispanic teenagers and african-american and hispanic adults? >> well, i have easily accessible the overall african-american unemployment rate, it dropped 2.2 points this month down to 13.6%. >> is that significant? >> that's significant. >> and wouldn't what do you attribute that to, do you have any idea from what you can see? >> again, the numbers add up to african-americans leaving unemployment and finding jobs. >> hispanics? >> hispanic rate was 10.5% in

january, down about half a point but not a significant difference. >> now, one of the most persistant challenges since 2007 economic collapse is the issue of long-term unemployment, as i mentioned in my opening remarks, more than 40% of the people unemploy vd been jobless six months or more and 70% of the long-term unemployed have been out of work for a year longer. what long-term unemployment trends are you seeing? and then i will turn it over to mr. brady. >> the number of people looking for work for 27 weeks or more has fallen over the last year by about 700,000. just as unemployment has fallen over the last year. but in percentage terms, long-term unemployed still represent a large share of the unemployed, about 42.9% this month. little different from 43.9% a year earlier. >> right. mr. brady? >> thank you, mr. chairman. mr. galvin, obviously, we're

always encouraged by new job numbers. we see the unemployment rate going down but, again, we want it to go down because people are getting jobs and not just getting out of the workforce. when the recession began, the labor participation rate, the people who were actively in this workforce, was 66%. today it's now, according to the latest report, 63.7%. that's the lowest since 1983. are fewer workers in the workforce indicative of a healthy economy? >> well, honestly, is that a sign of a healthy economy that fewer people are working in the workforce?

>> some of the decline in the labor force since the recession is due to demographic reasons. overall the productive capacity of the economy is higher, the more the participation of workers in the labor force. >> the c.b.o. this week indicated that unemployment will rise this year and next. and that at this pace of job growth, that we won't -- america won't get back to its level of unemployment before the recession until 2015. do you have any reason to disagree with those projections? >> well, be avoid forecasting like that, sort of an exercise that acquires a lot of assumptions and judgments and we try to stick to the facts of describing the current labor market.

>> in the -- taking a look at the numbers this month, in the jobs report numbers you report each month, it's in that number, isn't it, that could go up if businesses lay off fewer workers than before, or even though they may not be hiring more new ones, i don't know if that fact is widely recognized. and could you comment on the term job creation in this context t doesn't necessarily mean that everyone keeps their jobs, and more jobs are filled, does it? >> correct. a lot of turning in the economy each month. this number we report from the payroll survey is a net number, reflecting the difference between the additions to payroll or higher and subtractions from payroll or separations and quits. >> in the chart behind me, we're still again looking at the bigger picture. what does it take to have a healthy recovery? here we are years after the recession officially ended, we're still in the

stop-and-start mode and fairly uncertain, clearly, you know. the new hires continue to be about where they were in the middle of the recession. can you comment? we get these reports, i guess they're called the jolts report, not as frequently as we get your employment situation reports. how can we get more insight into critical numbers like this before the next jolts report comes out? how can we look more quickly at important indicators like this? >> you're right. the jolts numbers are lagged about a month and a half behind the payroll survey numbers. we don't have any data more timely than jolts to tug about what's going on beneath the net payroll employment from the payroll survey. >> let me finish with this again going back. we are looking for indicators of

a healthy economy. new jobs numbers are good. number of people working is a key indicator. my number show that if we actually had account of those who have given up or are not on the workforce today, that this month unemployment rate actually would have gone up from 11.6% to 11.7%. do you figure those numbers as you do your reports? >> no, we don't. >> yield back, mr. chairman. >> thank you very much. >> thank you for this report. it's good news, especially in the number of unemployment rate dropping for five straight months. that's very good news and we're trending in the right direction with 23 months of job gains, 243,000 for this month alone. can you point out other bright spots in this report, any other good news that you see that the

country is trending in the right direction? >> well, the rise in payroll employment of this month of 243,000 is a sizable one, compared to the path of payroll employment last year, which averaged monthly gains of 152,000. some of the gains this month in the private sector were widespread. note annually we saw large gains in professional and business services, leisure and hospitality, in health care employment, in manufacturing, which gained 50,000 jobs. and in construction, which has been flat since 2008. but it's now recorded a couple increases totaling 52,000 in not residential, specialty trade contractors. >> often january numbers don't

show this kind of gains. is this unusual for january numbers? >> no. we adjust the numbers for normal recurring seasonal variation in january and in any month. we try to take that normal variation out of there so what you're looking at is just the underlying trend in the labor market. >> and mr. galvin, i'm interested in making sure that the economy improves for all sectors and can you tell me whether the unemployment rate has been dropping for women or just men seeing this unemployment drop? >> we will get right with you on that. we have seen -- the unemployment rate for money has dropped for

more than women. it was not much more are in the recession as for women. both went up. they're both lower than they were, they're not as low as they were at the start of the recession, obviously. >> we know many state and local governments have been laying off workers and women predominantly work in state and local governments. do you think that is part of the cause that the women's unemployment rate? >> i think the fact that the men's rate has come down more than the women's is that is a reflection of the fact men were more affected and industry that's were hard hit cyclically like manufacturing and construction. >> now, when you were talking about the long-term unemployed and you said earlier long-term unemployed was continuing, do you have a breakdown in age of people that are saying, and the people are giving up, is it

predominantly 55 and older or do you have a breakdown in age in the long-term unemployed? is there a trend in that sector? >> one second. we do have that. let's move on and mr. nar doan will find that. >> also, do you break down regions, are there certain region that's are booming or doing better with the employment and dropping of the unemployed rate? do you see the south, east, the west, any areas that are urban areas, are they more hard hit than others? do you have any trends in geography and how the workers of our country are faring?

>> we have to get back to you on the breakdown of the long-term unemployed and also geographical differentials in the drop in unemployment rate. >> thank you for your hard work. my time has expired. thank you. >> mr. campbell? >> thank you, mr. chairman. sometimes we get these statistics t. happens with c.p.i. as well. the feel on the ground is different than what the statistic is. certainly recently where c.p.i. was kind of low but the feel on the ground was things people were buying were going up at a faster rate than c.p.i. i admittedly come from one of the highest unemployment states, from california. but the feel on the ground, as much as these statistics or the main statistic is good, feel on the ground isn't quite as good at least where i come from. one of the things i want to ask about is -- correct me if i'm

wrong on this -- but where the unemployment we talked about percentage drop from 8.5% to 8.3%, that the widest measure of unemployment, which includes discouraged marginally attached and part-time people who would prefer to be full time actually increased slightly but 23.8%, if i have my numbers correct. so how does -- what does that mean or how does that happen, so the sort of headline number went down but the broader number went up. >> the widest number of usage that is the largest for economic reasons and that's 15.1% in january as compared to 8.3% for the base unemployment rate.

that was unchanged over the month. the widest measure. >> ok. so that was unchanged but the other went down. so that means that maybe some of the these people who became employed became employed as part time, is that what that means? or buschdy the way, that does marginally attached mean? >> that means workers who want and are available for work, they've looked in the last year for jobs but they haven't looked in the last month. >> they looked in the last year but not the last month? >> they need to have looked in the last month to be counted as unemployed. >> i see. they are not employed but you don't count them in the number that includes 8.3? >> correct. >> so on the border number of -- on the broadest number, and i read the wrong number, 15.1% of the population is the broad number that is unemployed or

underemployed with the part-time, and that didn't change from last? >> correct. it has declined pretty much in step with the decline in the regular unemployment rate over the last five months. >> ok. the total workforce, civilian labor force, was actually up, was it? >> uh-huh. >> and so the total labor force was up as well, is that right? i'm trying to understand because we -- you do -- on this sometimes as, you know, numerator dean nominater of unemployment drop when people drop out of the workforce. and it make it's look like we're doing better but -- but we're

actually not employing more people. >> over these five months where the unemployment rate has come down .8%, the level of unemployed has declined by 1.2 million, but at the same time the level of employed from the household survey is up 1.7 million. so the sum of those is labor force so you've got unemploy subtracted from the employed and you get a rise in the labor force about half a million over this time period. >> ok. i yield back, mr. chairman. >> thank you very much, mr. sanchez. >> thank you very much, gentlemen, for being before us today. i want to go along some of the discussion points my colleague from orange county on the other side was talking about. i'm interested in -- first

because you mention pplation in your report or population group. i'm trying to understand what does that mean. in particular when you look at the overall numbers, there's this thing called baby boomers and a lot of them are getting to retirement age. and supposedly that was the largest group of people in a particular time frame. that the united states had seen. so my question to you is,, are we seeing baby boomers retire and therefore be out of the workforce? is that having some impact to that? are we graduating or seeing enough young people in the w that we're making up the numbers? what's the relationship between two ends of the employment line? my next question is could you in some way characterize what's going on with the use in particular, those without a college degree and maybe those

with a college degree but it does seem that on -- that in the weeds, where we are when we go home, that kids aren't getting employment, despite getting an education. >> i will have my colleague, mr. nardone, handle that. >> in terms of looking at one thing that will be useful is look at labor force participation rates and taking a somewhat longer view, one thing that's been happening is that the labor force participation rates for people age 55 and over, which would include that baby boom group, is actually been going up a little bit. labor force participation rates for younger people over a longer period have been trending down partly, there also been an increase in school enrollment among those young people too.

young people in school can be in the labor force. they can have part-time job where they can be looking for work. in general of people in school are less likely to be in the labor force than those who aren't. >> so what you're basically telling me is -- do you think that might be attributed to the fact maybe bhome thought they had a retirement sort of lost their retirement or don't feel as comfortable about having enough money? maybe they're living longer and going back whether it's a mcdonald's job or part-time consultant or what have you and they tend to take up those places we might have seen young people before? could that be what's going on? >> we don't really know the exact reason. one thing we know is the increase in labor participation rate for people 55 and over actually predated the recession that had been going on since the 1990's really. >> interesting. ok.

i know mrs. maloney i think asked about this. this is about geography. it seems to me, can we tell where these jobs are being created? it seemed to me like a lot of these jobs that are being created may be moving south or southwest in the country. do we have numbers on that? o. would you be able to get us numbers so we can take a lock where jobs are really being created and where we're losing them? >> i do have some numbers on that with me today. our state numbers lag a month. we reported national numbers for january but our state numbers are only available through december. looking at the december numbers, the states with the largest gain since the national employment trough in early 2010 on a job bases have been texas, california, florida, simply the largest states.

on a percentage basis, percentage growth basis, the states with the largest change, north dakota, utah, texas, oklahoma, wyoming. >> thank you. my last question real fast, when we talk about going back to this whole maybe underemployed or still searching for the real job you want, do we have -- i know you gave us a particular cost or average per wage of $23 or $24. does that include benefits? are we see changes in the type of jobs? is there smaller benefit package going with those jobs? are there numbers available with that in the aggregate? >> those numbers gave you are wages only. we issued an earlier cost number report earlier i believe that

showed the cost benefit to employers growing faster than cost wages. zroint information though about the nature of the benefit packages for jobs being created right now. >> so let me just rephrase that. if i'm an average employer getting an average person on the payroll for the first time. i'm paying them about $24 but the benefit package to them is actually costing me more than it used to per employee? >> correct. >> thank you, mr. chairman. i appreciate that. >> thank you. >> thank you. i will stay away from the policy issues and make sure i can understand the data. so i will run down a list quickly and make sure i'm reading it correctly. the labor force participation rate dropped last month from 64% to 63.7%? >> correct. >> the number of discouraged workers was up from roughly

945,000 to 1.05 million people, is that correct? >> correct. >> the number of other marginally attached workers grew from 1.595 million to 1.75 million last month? >> the other -- have i to do the math there. that looks right. >> the number of folks who are employed part time for economic reasons grew from 8.098 million people to 8.23 million people last month? >> correct. >> unemployed by widest measure grew from 27.4 million to 28.3 million people last month, is that correct? >> i don't -- have i to dig for that level. i have the rate. >> 15.2 to 15.1? >> correct. >> percent of total long-term unemployed, long term is the total percentage last month rose from 42.7% to 43.3%, and that's

defined by folks out of work more than six months, 27 weeks? >> it rose .4% to 42.9%? >> ok. >> and then the graph that chairman brady offered is up here behind us shows that the number of total hires is roughly the same now on a monthly basis as it was in late 2008. would you agree with that sir? >> if those numbers are correct, yes, i would. i have in data which our jolt survey which shows jolts hires increased some since the end of the recession. it doesn't appear that, that line is going up. >> i think that's correct. end of the recession and new hires last month. your statement is probably correct but i think mine is as well. if you go back to late 2008, the blue the dotted vertical line there. >> current hires are below that

level. >> exactly. >> if we had this discouraged workers, other marginally attached workers and folks unemployed part time for economic reasons, the unemployment rate in this country is 15.1% this month? >> correct. >> thank you, sir. you mentioned earlier labor force has grown slightly and it looks like it has from 15. -- excuse me, 153.9 million people to 154.4. given the population gloge over the same period of time, is that the growth in the size of the labor force you would expect to see? >> that depends on the degree to which the growth and population participates in the labor force. generally, you would expect an increase of somewhere from 100 to 150,000 per month zwroust keen up with the population and their rate of participating. >> i'm sorry, say that again.

you would expect the number of jobs to grow 150,000, 150,000 jobs per month? >> expect the labor force. well, you need about 100,000 to 150,000 per month to keep up with the growth in the labor force. >> so if we had 150,000 jobs per month, all other things being equal, unemployment rate will not come down? >> correct. all other things being equal, participation rate will stay the same and the jobs being found will go to the new folks coming into the labor force. >> the rate of job creation last month, all other things being equal, how long will it take for us to get employment down to say 6 1/2%? >> that requires a lot of speculation i need to-to-avoid because i really -- to be honest, i can't predict rates which people will enter the labor force. i can tell you that the job

growth we have seen since employment turned around is measured by the payroll survey is still about 5.6 million below, still about 5.6 million drop or loss from -- still 5.6 million jobs to be gained in order for us to regain all of the jobs lost during this downturn. >> thank you plrks galvin. >> on page 3 of your report, you indicate government jobs are down over the course of the last 12 months, with declines in local government, state government, excluding education and u.s. postal service. if you add education back into those numbers, what does that job loss within the government sector look like? >> one second. i will get that for you.

>> that's the total over the year you just gave me. >> yes, sir. 276,000 jobs were lost in government over 2011, and that's total of federal, state, both education and noneducation components and local, both education and noneducation components. >> i'm sorry, i'm looking at your notes on page 3 that specifically says that state government, excluding education. i took that to mean any gains in education were excluded from that number, is that not correct? >> no, that's just a way of breaking down the state government total because some people are interested in that. the education sector and noneducation sectors -- sector of the state government. >> i apologize for going a little long, mr. chairman. i guess my question is where are the education jobs contained -- the list on page three, if we added one education job, looks like we have inspect since the beginning of the recession. added education jobs from

november to december. on page three, if we hire a teacher, what category does it go into? >> i think just in terms of local over the year, 7.8 down from 7.9 a year ago. state government education you had -- it's essentially flat, about 2.4 million. private education, i think, may have gone up. >> so education is roughly flat over the course of the last year? >> if you're looking at government education, state and local, it's down mainly, state government education is flat over the years. >> i got you. gentlemen, thank you very much. >> mr. berthous.

>> i apologize for not having the graphic here but edge understands that the recovery has been slower and much more prolonged than other recessions, certainly that have occurred during my lifetime and years just proceeding that. can you give us reasons why the recovery has been so painfully slow in occurring? >> i don't know that i have the reasons but i certainly can confirm that as compared to the recessions in 1975 and '82, job recovery in this recession is much slower. as compared to the recession of 1991 and 2003, where it ended in 1991 and 2003 job recovery after this recession is somewhat slower. >> i did take the liberty of

preparing some economic data. i realize that's not my forte. and at the risk of relating two things that are not related, i decided to plot the unemployment rate for the last 10 years and i put on the graph also, since it's been the subject of some national discussion, the minimum wage increases that have recently occurred. you can see there, there does appear to be a parallel. i realize there's a risk in relating two thing that's may not be related, but do you have a comment on those two in association to the lines on the graph? >> we don't engage in that sort of policy analysis. we don't want to do anything to undermine your trust in our objectivity and fairness. >> the reality is though this changes the unemployment rate. you and i referenced in my opening statement there are some things that the administration has done but other things congress has done. some things congress did during the last administration when speaker pelosi took over as speaker of the house. and this was one of those things.

now it's relevant because people are discussing maybe we should just index the minimum wage to inflation. and what i see looking at this is a period of relative stability while minimum wage stayed at $5.15 an hour, perhaps we're achieving a new equilibrium at the other end of the graph. if you index minimum wage to inflation, would it likely have this disruptive effect that perhaps occurred during the 2007/2008, 2009 and 2010? >> i really can't comment on policy questions like that. >> let me ask you this, does the size of the labor force change this past month? >> it did. >> civilian labor force? >> yes. well, after adjusting for population controls, it was up 250,000, that's a small change.

>> but another way of looking at it, those not in the labor force increased from 86.7 million to 87.9 million. is that an accurate reflection? >> there's an issue with this month's numbers as was mentioned in the testimony, we incorporate a new population estimates that are based on the census 2010, which can makes the difference between december and january not strictly comparable. essentially, those new population controls showed that there were more people who are over the age of 55 and more people who are between the ages of 16 to 24, groups that are less likely to be in the labor force than the general population. so you have what looks like a big bump up in the number of people not in the labor force. if you adjust for that artificial -- the population control, it's actually down by 75,000, the size of the

population that's not in the labor force. >> this may fall into that broad category of statistics but still 1.2 million people lost from the labor force, that's a big chunk of folks. ok, we massage the numbers and make it look not so bad. but you just have to worry if we're losing people from the labor force at that rate, yeah, you make your numbers look better as far as unemployment rate, if you're gold post is november 2012, but what people are feeling out in the country, what people are experiencing in the country and this is what i encounter when i go home, people say don't talk to me about the economic recovery because even in texas, we're not feeling it. i would rather suspect if i was visiting california or ohio or michigan, i would hear those same sentiments perhaps even a little more strongly. let me just ask you in the time i have remaining, the fact that there are fewer payroll jobs

than there were prerecession, and this month you gained 200,000, so coming back at a rate 2060,000 a month. say this month in the new normal. this is the new benchmark. every month will be like this month going forward, when do we get back to the prerecession level? >> it would take 23 more months of growth at this month's pace, to regain all of the jobs. >> if the number drifted down from that obviously, the length of time is going to extend. what do you look to -- let me ask you this -- you referenced in your figures the mining. is that the oil and gas development that occurs also? >> uh-huh. >> with did see positive reflection there? >> correct. >> even with the price of natural gas being fairly low.

price of oil has maintained a high level. but the overall outlook for that sector is something that's positive or negative? >> well, we avoid forecasting but mining has been growing recently due to support activities for oil and gas mining. >> again, i would re-emphasize the administration could go a long way towards the economic recovery of this country, producing american jobs and american energy. i think your data today supports that. mr. chairman, i cannot see the clock so i have no idea if i'm yielding back time or run over. if i run over -- >> about b two minutes over. >> i appreciate your indulgence and yield back whatever time remains. we might in the future try to have the clock where it's visible to the participants. >> i agree. >> one last question. let me just pick up on something that was talked about. the public sector jobs, lost a

lot of jobs in the public sector, have we not? you said 276,000? >> correct, over the year. well, that was a loss -- >> that's correct. >> 276,000 government jobs lost over the year. >> do you see a trend with regard to the loss of those jobs? in other words, is that steady trend going down? we hear a lot of complaints about public service workers and -- making government smaller and i know we're talking about, i think you said state, local and federal, right? >> correct. government has been losing since -- pretty steadily since near the end of 2010. >> the question that i always ask is, somebody watching this today, and they were trying to find employment based upon what

you see there, what are the areas, the fields that you would tell them are -- not that you would be given advice, just tell them what seems to be growing, the fields that seem to be growing and geographic areas, somebody who's really desperate for a job and trying to get something out of this hearing as to where they might go to get a job? >> this week, just published employment projections for the period ending 2020. so they provide sort of the job outlook for occupations. just to summer rise, these projections show the largest number of jobs are in three sort of classes of occupations. one is called office souun port of course pakes, jobs like customer service representatives and book keeping clerks.

second category of projected growth is in health care practitioners and technical occupations. jobs like registered nurses, which we project to grow by 700,000 jobs, by 2020. and physicians and surgeons are in that group too. and the group with the third largest rate of increase for projected growth is saleses and related occupations. jobs like sales representatives and cashiers. >> what about geographic areas, if somebody wants to move from a state that has a very high unemployment rate. i think you mentioned earlier a few states that were doing pretty good with regard to jobs. what states would you tell them that they might want to look at? >> we don't do -- >> i know texas would be one.

>> we don't do these projections by state but regarding unemployment rate, states with the lowest unemployment rates in our most recent release december 2011 were north dakota, nebraska, south dakota, new hampshire, vermont, iowa, minnesota. >> just two minutes, three minutes. >> i won't need that much time at all, mr. chairman. mr. galvin, to follow up on a question the chairman asked you a second ago, 276,000 government jobs lost in 2011, approximately what percentage of the overall government workforce does that number represent? >> we'll have to dig that up. >> i thought i had seen a number of roughly 22 million government jobs as of last month.

>> state, local and federal? >> yes, sir,ible it to be. >> that would be the decline of -- 12.2% of the level in january 2011. >> so for all of 2011, the size of the government workforce, federal, state and local, shrank by 1.2%? >> i believe that's correct. >> mr. galvin said earlier in his testimony that we're still 5.6 million jobs short in the overall economy from the beginning of the recession. what percentage does that represent of the overall workforce? >> it's about 4% of the current

workforce. i don't really have what it was the decline from the start. >> it would be a little higher but about the same. >> thank you, gentlemen, that's all i have. >> mr. berthous, two minutes. -- burgess. >> we were grappling with the unemployment extension here on the floor this week and next week. typically in your experience, purely from a statistical perspective and not policy perspective, not asking you to speculate, but when unemployment benefits run out, what typically happens to the unemployment rate? >> well, that is a policy question. >> i'm asking for statistical analysis. have you looked at it from previous years. is there a trend or is this a non sequitur? >> we haven't looked at the relationship between the rise in the unemployment rate and rise in unemployment insurance. >> would you be good enough to look at that for me and respond

to me between this month and next month? that is something i know holds a lot of interest for a lot of us. >> it's not something d.l.s. does but we can look around at what other studies are out there and bring them to your attention. >> i would appreciate that. >> the bureau clearly tracks the length of period of time folks are on unemployment. is there data available that would or could show us when folks on the average come off unemployment and go back into the workforce, whether it be in week two or eight or 27? >> we don't actually track when people are on unemployment insurance. we have statistics how long they're unemployed before they find employment or go out. we develop thad over the past year went can provide an article that we wrote about that to you. >> thank you, gentlemen, i appreciate that. >> gentlemen, i want to thank

you very much. and mr. galvin, again, it does appear we are moving in the right direction. not moving as fast as all of us would like because so many people are unemployed, i know particularly in my district i see it every day. i live amongst it. high rate of unemployment. the fact is we're moving in the right direction. i want to thank you very much. >> thank you. >> sunday on "newsmakers" the strategy to win 25 more seats to take control of the house of

representatives this fall. that's at 10:00 a.m. and 6:00 p.m. here on c-span, c-span radio and c-span.org. >> tomorrow on "washington journal" a look at the joint investigation by n.p.r. and propublica on freddie mac's business practices with chris arnold of n.p.r. and jeffreyizinger. and after that discussion of the january unemployment rate with robert feldman of georgetown university. later, look ahead at saturday's nevada caucuses and president obama's campaigning efforts in the state. live at 7:00 a.m. eastern here on c-span. >> republican presidential candidate mitt romney said the lower unemployment rate and increase in in jobs announced earlier friday was good news. he said he hoped it would continue. the former massachusetts government made these remarks in sparks, nevada outside of reno in the western nevada supply company.

following his comments he spoke to the employees in the next room. nevada is holding their republican caucuses tomorrow. this is about 30 minutes. >> and i have to answer that question. but i want to get the other comments raised here. i appreciate your perspective. my guess is none of you would stand up and say that the policies of the administration over the last two years have been real helpful to you and your business. that's my impression. i believe the economy will come back. it always does. it has taken a lot longer than it should have to come back. in part because of the policies of this administration have not been helpful. they in fact have been harmful. they slowed down recovery and made it more difficult and as a result american families suffered, businesses have laid off people and had a hard time rebuilding. and for that, the president deserves the blame that he will receive in this campaign.

i think there was a disadvantage that he had upon being elected. and that was he had a democratic house and democratic senate and he didn't think he needed to work with the opposition party. as perry indicated, he thought he could do it with his own party. he didn't realize he had to bring people together. the role of a leader is not just to take the people who agree with you and drive through what they want but instead bring all of the americans together. get people on both parties to work together. he violated that premise for the first two years of his administration and pushed through a number of pieces of legislation his base voters wanted but frankly made it hard for enterprises to recover. whether it was obama care or dodd frank. we talked about banks. one of the reasons banks are scared to death about loaning right now is because they have a huge piece of legislation, over 2,000 pages, something called dodd-frank and they look at it and say they don't foe what will happen to them, whether they will be be deemed insolvent,

whether regulators and inspectors will come in and say this asset isn't worth as much as they thought it was, and put them in insolvency. so instead of working with homeowners to renegotiate mortgages, they want to put them in foreclosure. so they become less flexible, not more flexible at a time they should have been more flexible. like wise in the lending to businesses, i was with the head of bage money center bank in new york. and he said they had literally hundreds of lawyers working on implementing dodd-frank. community banks don't have hundreds of lawyers. and so what they have done is tend freeze and stop in place and not provide the capital that small business needs to be able to grow. so i will just note part one was the president, never having led anything before, came into a setting where he didn't need anyone across the aisle to work with him and pursued an agenda that made it harder for business to regroup and start hiring again and get our economy on the

right track. i would also tell you i listened to the president's state of the union address the other night and he laid out what he thought you had to do to get an economy to grow. i was listening carefully, maybe more carefully than you all were. he sent it off with four, five things and i said let's go through -- we need more corporate taxes. he's raised them. he said we need less regulation. he's increased it. he said we need to have all of the above energy policy. he's made it almost impossible to get coal, oil and gas in the ground. need to crackdown on cheaters like china. he has it. i looked at what he said you need to do, recognize he's done the exact opposite of all of those things, which simply proves the point what he has done is not help get this economy going. and i look to do do exactly what we described, regulation we have

and we continue to hire more and more regulators. i think the number is president obama hired over 200,000 new government regulators. more people whether it's osha or e.p.a., more people to come in and slow down the process. and at time needs to speed up the process. driller for oil and gas. miners for coal or people who want to build new facility, new roads, it should have been sped up and it was slowed down. this recovery has been slower than it should have been. people have been suffering longer than they should have had to suffer. will it get better? i think it will get better. i don't know how long it will take. good news on job creation in january. i hope that continues. we get people back to work. that is the antidote, by the way, to falling home prices is people going back to work. being able to buy homes. at that dote to what's going on right here in the supply business. people can go back to work, buy more things, fix up their homes,

put people back to work. that is going to happen. but this president has not helped the process. he's hurt it. sometimes i -- i get the impression speaking with you, you don't think you have a friend in washington. i can assure you if i'm the president i will see what you do as being a very good thing. patriotic and good thing, which is employing people. putting them to work. i like businesses that hire and that grow and that expand. i want you to be able to do that. if i'm president, i will work tirelessly to listen to you and people across the country to understand what we can do to encourage business to invest and grow and make the hard decision that it is to hire somebody and make that investment. i'm concerned about the flooding you described, michael, and i'm not -- wasn't aware of the setting here in northern nevada but will look at that if i'm able to get the job. i'm not big on making promises that suggest spending lots and

lots of money. some politicians go state to state and promise everything people want to hear. i will tell you i will look at things that are very important. clearly, if investment in infrastructure will yield great returns by people being willing to invest in business and hire more people who will then pay more taxes, that's the kind of investment i make. i like spending money which is associated with yielding more jobs and more returns and people going back to work and yields growth. what i don't like is spending money where there's no prospect of a return and where the investment will be lost. one comment blake mentioned. and that is the worry he has about his kids and grandkids. i very much identify with your comment in that regard. i say this because i used to be very worried about my kids. my kids are old enough. i'm less worried about them.

i'm now worried about my grandkids. i worry not so much about the short-term economic rebound, which i think will happen slowly. as i said because of the many mistake that's have have been made by this administration. i worry long term and if we keep adding a trillion dollars a year in debt, we will hit the greece wall and italy wall and spain and france wall. we will hit that at some point. and there's no one who can come in and save us at that point. no entity in the world large enough to bail out the united states of america. that's the road we're on. we will have to get lean and mean -- hopefully not mean but at least mean. and by that i mean we have to look at programs we spend money on that do not yield a return to our people at large that are unnecessary and that are placing a greater burden on coming generations. i will look through the federal budget line by line and if i see programs that are not critical, i will ask, is this program so

essential it's worth boreying money from china to pay for it? if not, i will eliminate the program. some of those programs are things we like but we simply have to say, even some things we like, we've got to stop paying for with government. and instead turn them over to the public and markets and charities but we can't -- i've got a long list. obama care is number one. i don't like it. we will just get rid of it. there are others. we spend money on amtrak. we subsidize amtrak. amtrak has to learn to stand on its own. if it doesn't, we're not going to keep sending hundreds of millions or billions of dollars to subsidize it. likewise pbs. we all like pbs and big bird. but the idea of spening taxpayer money, borrowing money from other people to pay for something as opposed to letting them get advertising to put dan's business back, doesn't get advertising like everybody else. big bird can be on tv with kellogg's corn flakes. and we have to -- exactly right.

we're going to have to see about that. not mean but at least lean and thoughtful about how to scale back on government, scale back on borrowing, have an administration that likes business, that likes businesses that hire people and that growth. and i spent 25 years in business. i know what it's like to add jobs. i know what it's like to lose jobs. it's painful, when anyone loses a job, it's a tragedy. i know how hard it is for you. i appreciate the effort to get people back to work. i will tell you, you will have a friend in the white house ifky get there. i will do everything in my power to make it easier for you to hire and grow and get projects done faster, stream it. what we did in our state, this is an aside after i heard the story from the head of that company that told me he wouldn't build in my state again, we came to state agencies and said we have to learn how to get permits

out in 180 days. we're going to have a program -- weerge have to say yes or no but it's 180 days and then provide funding to cities and town that's agree to make the same commitment. they will get their permits out within 180 days. we said to the cities and towns, if you want to be part of our business development effort that the state carries out, you have to commit to 180-day permitting. we have to do the same thing at the federal government level, which is to say guys, we have to set the time you get permits out. none of this, we will take as long as it takes going year after year, where all of the consultants get paid and bureaucrats get paid. that's got to end. we have to put people back to work in the private sector. thanks, guys. i think the people back here nervously telling me we have other folks in the other room that want to get a chance to say hi. so we will sneak on over. ♪

♪ that's what it's all about when they won't go to bed and do what you said or eat their food crying and you can't cuss but they say it too tired and numb and mad and the smile says i love you dad hey, that's what it's all about hey, this is the life i couldn't live without no, i couldn't live without if the moment is frozen in time and the reasons all begin to rhyme love is a little bigger and you finally start figuring out that's what it's all about ♪ >> hello. good morning.

what a great day in northern nevada. what a great day in america. how long have we looked across the country and see this going on and it's right here in northern nevada? i am not supposed to talk long and i am not going to. i will introduce a good friend, i want to make one comment. before i introduce our lieutenant governor, i want everybody to think about one thing. do we want a businessman who knows how to lead, or do we want a politician? i think that is what america has to ask themselves. i will introduce a good friend, our lieutenant governor of the united states of nevada -- one of these days.

>> thanks for the promotion. thank you for opening up the shot today, it is tremendous and fun, and i don't know if you had a chance to hear the round table. it was bought on, this is exactly the president we need. romney has been a familiar face to nevada, he knows our issues and he understands how nevada has been hurting. he knows the struggling and that has been happening, his policies, his vision, these are the things the country needs to turn this around. if you turn around businesses in the private life and create 100,000 jobs. he has taken of the big games and turned them into profitable enterprises had a magnificent spectacle that we can be proud of.

it is a $2 billion deficit, this is the kind of man we need in washington d.c.. i am planning to caucus with all my friends and families. i hope you are, too. if you are inclined otherwise, it should be a beautiful weekend. [laughter] thank you for being here and it is my great pleasure to introduce the man that i believe will be the next president of the united states, governor mitt romney. >> it is good to be here this morning, and it is kind of you to open up your shop. i see members of the western nevada supply operation and i they have a job right now. these are tough times.

mayor, could have you here. he went back to work and is getting ahead of you. mayor sparks is trying to get ahead of the mayor of reno but it won't work, will it? i spoke with the number of the business people who employ votes in the community and listen to their concerns. what i heard was very familiar. i have had the chance to go around the country and talk to business people at folks that work for various types of businesses and asked them how they feel about things. people are worried right now. it has been a tough three years. people are hurting in nevada and across the country. i was with a barber in new hampshire that was thinking of retiring. i asked him why, he said that i can't.

his retirement funds are not what he expected to be and he has had to cut back. now they are trying to figure out how to make ends meet. they're trying to keep food on the table. i talked to a lot of college kids. soldiers can't find work. it has been a tough time. i know the president did not cause this downturn. but he did not make it better, he made it worse. instead of focusing his energy on the economy and getting people back to work, he used it to put through a series of programs that he and his base and his friends thought were important. it made it harder for the economy to recover. for three years, american

families have been unemployed or underemployed. we have 24 million americans that are out of work or can only get part-time jobs. i don't have to tell you what happened to home values. the number of people that wonder if they're going to have at home at the end of the day. i was with one man that said this was heard to date, she was going to have her second child. they did not know of the home would be available to them or not. this is the nature of what was going on in america. people have suffered unnecessarily. i have spent my life in business. i have the experience of starting a business. it became one of the most successful of its kind in the world. i once went into business that got into real trouble, they

asked me to come in and help lead a, i was able to turn it around. because of the turnaround experiences, i was asked to come out to you got and run the olympic winter games. and after that, we came back to massachusetts. we were looking at a big deficit. we did not want to raise taxes because we knew it would hurt working families. i have learned through those experiences something about leadership and something about business and jobs. and why businesses lose jobs, how and why we are able to grow. but first about leadership. a leader does not work with the people just in his party or the people that agree with him, he

has to convince people across the aisle, people that disagree with them. right now, in our country, they are highly divided. you have republicans and democrats battling back and forth. but we don't have the leadership of a president that is willing to work and point out that the crisis that we face must be addressed by people in both parties. i was lucky enough to be collected in a state with a legislature that is slightly democrat. 85% democrat. i worked with people across the aisle to get things done with the people of my state. i also learned something in my business career and why jobs come and go. i learned that business can handle bad news, but what it can't handle is uncertainty. i have learned that what this president has done has made it

harder and harder for businesses to be able to grow and invest in people and hire people. almost every step the president has taken has unfortunately made it harder for businesses to understand the future and decide to grow and invest. it has permeated the entire economy. we talked this morning and one mentioned how hard it is to get a loan. i have talked to bankers, why aren't you giving loans to small business? why are you scared? this new legislation, to thousand pages, they are frightened to make loans. for fear the regulators will write them off and the bank will come and solvent. it didn't help give businesses loans. can you imagine wanting to invest in the health care product right now with obama

care hanging over you? are you thinking about hiring more people? is this going to raise my cost? so you pull back. there is the national labor relations board. you have the labour bodies, and they are doing what the bidding is. i don't know if my employees will be unionized. i will not hire as many as i would have wanted to in the past. how about deficits? the government spends $1 trillion more that cake tin. -- than you take in. you can't spend more money than you take in. you get to a point where you become like greece. you lose the potential to continue to provide for ourselves.

if i become president of the united states, i commit to being a friend of working people, employers, and to print your is, and evaders. i commit to making america the best place in the world for investment, hiring, job growth, and come growth. i will do everything i know how to make our economy the fastest job-creating machine in the world. i will make sure that the tax rates are not higher than the tax rate to around the world. we want to make sure we are competitive. i want the government regulators to do their job on accelerated basis in get out of the way, let businesses get back to building things like highways, bridges, schools, homes. we overwhelm our businesses

with regulations that are unnecessary. i also want to take advantage of energy resources. we have a president that has pushed off coal by virtue of regulations and burning it. i want to get natural gas out of the ground and energy resources, we are acting like an energy-poor nation. and goods and so we can sell products around the world. i will crack down on cheaters like china that manipulate currencies that make it harder for us to compete. and i will stop something out as crony capitalism. everyone has an idea of what that means, but it has been interesting to watch. solyndra was one example, they got $500 million of your money. it is now gone, evaporated.

there are car companies, electric car companies, friends of the democratic party that get money from government at the list goes on. people get money from government because the government thinks it is a good place to invest. someone talked about green jobs, the new definition is people that gave the green now get government money. i want to make sure that we have a comment -- a government that does not pick winners and losers. those are just five of the things i will do to get this economy going again. [applause] and let me mention another one, i will listen. i will listen to business

people and working people, and for folks to understand what is going on in their lives. the president was on a google town hall kind of feature and the woman said that her husband that was an engineer was out of work and had been out of work for a long time. he said he was surprised to hear that, he thought people, engineers were able to get jobs pretty easily. how can he be that detached from what is going on? the president of the united states needs to hear what the people of the united states are seeing and feeling. i will listen if i am president of the united states. [applause] i am running because i love america. i love the land of america and

the people of america. i am worried about the future for my kids and grandkids. the oldest, are you the oldest? he is 11. we have 11 down. rich kids? they will do ok, they have a dad. i am worried about the grand kids of america. i want to make sure their future is bright and promising. i am convinced there is nothing that keeps america from leading the world. i don't accept the idea that america is in decline. i don't believe that this is america's destiny, it is just a region or -- a detour. we will have great jobs with rising incomes for our families. i love the hymns of america. america the beautiful. i got put up a nice place, is a culpeper mail? -- pepper mill? i saw the mountains, this is a

beautiful city. mountains around, snow on the top of the peaks, and this is a nice spot. oh beautiful, for spacious skies, you have them. amber waves of grain, you don't have those. the purple mountains' majesty, you have those, too. i love america. those are the verses i love. oh beautiful for heroes approved in liberating strife, for more themselves their country love and mercy more than life. raise your hand hi, thank you. [applause] appreciate your service.

another verse, o beautiful for patriot dream that sees beyond the years. the idea is that the patriots, the founders of this country, and writing the founding documents were riding not just for their time, but beyond their years. i happen to believe the right course for america is to return to those principles. the declaration of independence and said the creator had endowed us with certain unalienable rights. among them, life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. in this country, we are free to pursue happiness as we choose, not as government tells us. we are not limited by the circumstances of our birth, we are free to pursue happiness of our own way. that freedom brought some of

the pioneers and innovators from all over the world, that is what made this nation the most powerful economic engine and the world. and the strongest nation to be able to defend our freedoms. i will take america a lot of very different course than this president. european-style social welfare state. i will get america working again and keep us the power house that we are destined to be. thank you so much, great to be with you this morning. thank you. ♪ [captioning performed by national captioning institute] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2012] ♪ ♪

>> nevada's caucuses are tomorrow. watch the road to the white house coverage with the candidates live tomorrow night. throughout the day, follow online with live reports from the individual caucuses and their results tweeted by the nevada republican party at c- span or -- c-span.org. you can also, on the facebook page. >> on saturday, c-span radio's supreme court's historic oral argument will. 2004 case on the capture of a member of a drug called to help charged with cap -- capturing a dea agent. starting at 6:00 p.m. eastern, listen to the the broadcast on c-span radio. or find it on line and c-span -- at cspanradio.org. >> sunday, democratic

congressional campaign committee chairman rip -- rip steve israel. that is at 10:00 a.m. and 6:00 p.m. eastern here on c-span. c-span radio and c-span.org. >> now, and house energy and commerce subcommittee hearing on the obama administration's decision to deny the keystone xl pipeline that would have to. oil from canada to the u.s.. this is in response to subcommittee republicans not infighting key witnesses for democrat and a previous hearing on january 25. for over two hours, you will hear testimony from engineers and the bureau of land management. later, remarks from nebraska rancher who supports president obama's decision to deny the pipeline. this is about two hours, 50

minutes. >> this is about the north american energy access act. this is being held to rule 11 of the house rose at the request of mr. waxman. although begin opening statements at the first hearing, pursuant to an agreement between them, each side this morning will be given 10 minutes for opening statement. at this time, i would like to recognize myself for five minutes. like many people, i was quite disappointed when the president decided to -- the keystone pipeline was not in the national interest. the reason he gave for making that decision was that there was not enough time to collect and review information regarding them route from nebraska. we are very much aware that the application for the permit was filed in september of 2008.

that was almost 3.5 years ago. as a matter of fact, as far back as a c-span.org." >> october 2010, -- as a matter of fact, as far back as october 2010, hillary clinton in response to a question said that she was inclined to approve the permit for the keystone pipeline based on the information she had. i also want the public to know, and i am sure they are aware of this, that five major labor unions support it and still support the building of this pipeline. in an article entitled "labor, civil war come over keystone ex- el" the author recorded some of president obama's labor supporters fuming over his decision. the unions representing construction workers that would directly benefit from building the pipeline -- as he said in

the article, feel stabbed in the back by using a joint environmental groups to kill the project. laborers international union in north america general president said the decision was so repulsive and disgusting that he was going to pull his union out of the blue-screen alliance and coalition of environmental groups and labor unions that represent nearly all of the groups that signed a statement supporting the president. mr. sullivan said, unions and an arm to groups that have no equity in this work at kitzhaber members in the teeth and a there is an understatement -- have kicked our members in the teeth. we will not sit at the table with people who this story our members' livelihood. a labor unions issued a forceful statement condemning the decision as politics at its worst. mr. john sweeney, the director

of global labor institute at cornell university, who did a study about that job that this would create, made it clear that -- he said this decision was about the president being reelected. the president's re-election is at stake. he said there is more at stake here than a simple pipeline. in closing, i would like to quote from an editorial in the chicago tribune. keystone should be approved. this is a good project. it will give us energy and give us jobs. you want stimulus, this is it. this is a $7 billion project to be done with private dollars. taxpayer dollars will not be used. president obama made a decision that we think is the wrong decision. with that, -- does anyone seek recognition? >> i will recognize you later.

>> all right. >> sure, mr. chairman. i think the gentleman for yielding. i appreciate his comments. i was reviewing the testimony by the gentleman from the bureau of land management. it is interesting, and our government rules come into play here for so little land. the total permanent right of way on the public land for the keystone project would be approximately 50 feet wide and comprise a total of approximately 270 acres. let that sink in. you think about hi mike -- fmia -- how minor a role to the government is playing in terms of this role and yet they are disapproving it. there is no jeopardy under the

endangered species act. the federal government -- to 70 acres, 50 feet wide. we of that horrible unemployment problems. it is getting a little better. he of a $7 million potential investment that could create thousands of jobs. -- if you have a $7 million potential investment that could create thousands of jobs. i think it is time to get this done. i yield back. >> thank you. this time i recognize the gentleman from illinois, mr. rushed for 5 minutes. >> thank you for holding this important hearing. the minority side requested this in order to heal from the importance stakeholders. -- hear from the importance stakeholders who were not invited to last week's hearing. we want to shine light on the ramifications of this. mr. chairman, this bill is

simply another attempt -- [inaudible] they want to green light a project that has not been fully vented. -- vetted. [inaudible] instead of the north american energy assets act, they should be renamed it the republicans in congress transcanada act. this is not make sense. legally, it does not make sense. physically, it does not make sense. it shifts the responsibility -- [inaudible]

this is an agency which has no experience in setting this type of project. this bureau does not make sense. it does not make sense morally. as we heard from the assistant secretary of state last week, speaking on the bureau of international environmental and scientific affairs, the recommendation to deny the permit was made simply because there was not sufficient time for the agency to complete its due diligence and perform its legal oversight responsibility due to the fact that currently, there is not even a proposed

route to for the state department to review. it would have been an act of negligence and recklessness for the obama administration to approve a permanent for a pipeline that would cut through the heart of the country when the policy makers have not even identified the most appropriate route for the pipeline to go through. while the language the republicans had in their initial effort to force the administration to come up with a decision was -- within 60 days of enactment of the middle class. tax extension was ill considered and irresponsible, i must say the language in this new bill, which was transferring the

decision to a different ending -- completely inexperienced agency requires commission to make a decision within 30 days or the project will be automatically approved -- this is even more irrational and irresponsible. the separate -- the assistant secretary of state says the decision was based on the fact that the exact route of the pipeline has yet to be identified in critical areas. as a result, there are unresolved concerns for a full range of issues, including energy insecurity, foreign- policy, economic problems, health safety, and

environmental impact amongst other considerations. she went on to say that the legislation raises serious questions about legal authorities, questions -- [inaudible] all of the state land use authority over the pipeline -- it overrides foreign-policy and national-security considerations implicated by a others. these are assisted by the state department. mr. chairman, i think we owe it to the american public to explain the consequences of this legislation to ensure that the public understands. i yield back. complexity by. complexity by.