Obama signs jobs measure

March 19, 2010 at 12:00a.m.

Associated Press

WASHINGTON

President Barack Obama has said he wants to focus laserlike on the public’s top concern: jobs. But the ongoing effort to remake the nation’s health-care system keeps getting in the way.

The White House had a ceremony Thursday in the Rose Garden where Obama signed into law a $38 billion jobs bill with a modest mix of tax breaks and spending designed to encourage the private sector to start hiring again.

There is debate about how much the jobs package, which includes $18 billion in tax breaks and $20 billion for highway and transit programs, will actually encourage hiring. Optimistic estimates are that the tax breaks could generate 250,000 jobs by year’s end, a tiny portion of the 8.4 million jobs the economy has shed since the recession began in December 2007.

The jobs bill is the first of several that Democrats have promised in an election year to show they are addressing voters’ biggest worry. Republicans are united in opposition to Obama’s health-care overhaul, but 11 Republicans were among the 68 senators who voted Wednesday to send the bill to the president.

Under the package, businesses that hire anyone who has been out of work for at least 60 days would be exempt from paying the 6.2 percent Social Security payroll tax on that employee through December. The government would reimburse the Social Security trust fund for the lost revenue.

Employers would get an additional $1,000 credit for each new worker remaining on the job for a full year.