Obama Calls On Congress to Act Fast on Stimulus

Video

Obama Holds Press Conference on Economic Crisis

President-Elect Barack Obama speaks about the current economic crisis hardships, and ways he plans to help combat them.

» LAUNCH VIDEO PLAYER

"Our view on Colombia is that Colombia deserves to get done on its own merits. As for what Democrats want to get done, they haven't spelled that out," Fratto said later. "We can't get this done by smoke signals. They have to be clear about their intentions."

Democrats could simply wait until the new administration takes office in January to pass a stimulus package. Yesterday, Obama said he wanted to see the measure pass "sooner rather than later."

Obama said he would review how the Treasury is implementing its plan to spend $700 billion to rescue the financial markets, including whether bank executives receiving government help are being unduly rewarded by their firms. He added that he would move with "all deliberate haste" to make appointments and order his transitional economic team to work on additional options to aid automakers.

The team, drawn from a broad swath of academia and finance, convened behind closed doors at the Hilton Chicago. Members included former Treasury secretary Lawrence H. Summers, newly appointed chief of staff Rahm Emanuel, Vice President-elect Joseph R. Biden, Michigan Gov. Jennifer M. Granholm (D) and Time Warner chairman Richard Parsons. Billionaire investor Warren E. Buffett participated via speakerphone. Buffett is a director of The Washington Post Co.

Obama's comments came on a day when two Detroit automakers reported larger-than-expected quarterly losses: Ford lost $129 million while General Motors lost $2.5 billion. The GM news was especially dour, with the company saying that by the end of the year its cash situation would approach "the minimum amount necessary to operate its business."

Meanwhile, poor quarterly results continued streaming in from other sectors of the economy. Sprint Nextel lost $326 million. Genworth Financial, an insurance company, lost $258 million. Sunrise Senior Living, a McLean firm, lost $68.7 million. Among the bright spots: pawnshop operator Ezcorp, which reported a 44 percent profit jump.

The nation's unemployment rate surged 0.4 percent in October, topping off at 6.5 percent, the highest level in 14 years. Many economists think the nation is headed for 8 percent unemployment, a figure not seen in a generation.

Last month, as the financial crisis escalated and companies lost access to credit, nonfarm payroll fell by 240,000 jobs, about 40,000 more than economists predicted. Adding to the grim picture, the government revised job loss figures from August, which jumped to 127,000 from 73,000, and September, which shot up to 284,000 from 159,000. In total, more than 10 million people are now without jobs.

"We are losing jobs faster than official statistics suggested before and faster than most people were expecting now," said William Cheney, chief economist at John Hancock Financial Services. "This shows that the job market over the last couple months has taken a dramatic turn for the worse."

Almost no sector has been immune to sharp declines in employment. Retail jobs fell by 38,000 in October, with car dealer and department store payrolls taking the worst hits. Construction jobs fell by 49,000. Financial sector jobs fell by 24,000. Manufacturing, down 90,000 jobs, was the hardest hit, though that figure includes 27,000 striking Boeing workers.

Economists said the rapid rate of job losses would beget more job losses.

"As job destruction takes hold it effects consumer spending, demand weakens, and then companies need to cut more jobs as demand for their products weakens," said Joshua Shapiro, chief U.S. economist at MFR. "We're still in the relatively early stages of this. To expect this to be painless and short is delusional."

Wall Street seemed to shrug off the news, with the Dow climbing 248 points, or nearly 3 percent, as traders bargain-hunted following two days of steep declines.

Staff writers Paul Kane, Dan Eggen and Lori Montgomery contributed to this report.