President Joe Biden called the United States economy the “strongest in the world’ as the January jobs report showed the country adding 353,000 jobs last month.
“Today, we saw more proof [of the economy’s strength], with another month of strong wage gains and employment gains of over 350,000 in January, continuing the strong growth from last year,” Biden said. “Our economy has created 14.8 million jobs since I took office, unemployment has been under 4% for two full years now, and inflation has been at the pre-pandemic level of 2% over the last half year.”
The economy beat expectations in January and added 353,000 jobs, the Bureau of Labor Statistics reported Friday morning, showing that the labor market started 2024 on strong footing after defying fears of a recession throughout 2023.
The unemployment rate stayed the same at 3.7%, a low number by historical standards.
“It’s great news for working families that wages, wealth, and jobs are higher now than before the pandemic, and I won’t stop fighting to lower costs and build an economy from the middle out and bottom up,” Biden said.
Despite the numbers, Biden’s approval rating on the economy remains a depressed 37.9%, per the RealClearPolitics polling average. With the election now coming into focus and questions lingering about the public perception of “Bidenomics,” he ended his statement by lashing out at the GOP.
“I’ll continue to stand in the way of efforts by Congressional Republicans to enact massive tax giveaways for the wealthy and big corporations; cut Medicare, Medicaid, and Social Security; and raise costs for American families,” Biden said.
CLICK HERE TO READ MORE FROM THE WASHINGTON EXAMINER
The Republican National Committee issued its own statement saying that due to inflation, real wages are still down 2.5% since Biden took office.
“Is Joe Biden going to celebrate a jobs report that showed that workers are taking home less money per week?” the RNC’s Tommy Pigott said. “Don’t take our word for it, according to former Obama economist Jason Furman, the fall in weekly hours indicates that the amount of money workers are taking home each week actually went down.”