President Barack Obama says there have been “somewhat encouraging” improvements in the country’s stricken labor markets but that the rate of joblessness is “still a sobering toll.”
The president came out to talk Friday shortly after the government reported that the jobless rate rose to 8.9 percent in April. At the same time, he announced a new plan to permit jobless young people to go back to college without losing their unemployment benefits.
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Obama said that “if we want to come out of this recession better than before, we have to make sure we have a workforce that’s trained better than before.” Nevertheless, the president also said, “The gears of our economic engine do seem to be slowly turning once again.”