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... In return for more spending, Mrs. Clinton could have offered serious structural reforms: repeal of Davis-Bacon, time limits on environmental reviews, serious cost-benefit analysis, and so forth. Such a package would have been irresistible. Instead her plan simply asserts that Mrs. Clinton will “break through Washington gridlock” and “cut red tape”—promises made and forgotten by every presidential candidate in living memory. If the Sierra Club sues to block her worthy commitment to “upgrade our dams and levees,” will she really short-circuit the legal process, and how? The rest of Mrs. Clinton’s economic agenda is a thousand-course smorgasbord of government...

(CNSNews.com) - President Obama says he will use his upcoming State of the Union Address to "mobilize the country around the national mission of making sure our economy offers everyone who works hard a fair shot at opportunity and success." In his weekly radio address on Saturday, he outlined some of the steps he'll take to make 2014 "a year of action." "Working folks are looking for the kind of stable, secure jobs that went overseas in the past couple decades. So next week, I'll join companies and colleges and take action to boost the high-tech manufacturing that attracts the...

President Obama found himself weathering bipartisan broadsides Wednesday as he sent Congress his 2014 budget proposal, which in its effort to please both sides of the aisle has ended up angering both. The budget arrived on Capitol Hill Wednesday morning, delivered 65 days after the legal deadline. The $3.77 trillion spending plan, which is over 2,000 pages, tries to curb deficits by further raising taxes on top earners and reining in the growth of Social Security. Obama called his plan "a fiscally responsible blueprint for middle class jobs and growth," during remarks he made Wednesday morning in the White House...

CAMP DAVID, Md. — Leaders of the world’s wealthiest nations opened the door Saturday to more government spending in Europe as way to revive the continent’s struggling economy, shifting away from the idea that the surest way to recovery was through strict fiscal austerity. Meeting at the Group of Eight summit at Camp David, President Obama and his fellow leaders said they were committed foremost to creating jobs and growth, a shift, at least in emphasis, from previous gatherings dominated by German efforts to reduce high government debt through drastic fiscal reform. In a joint statement, the leaders of eight...

However there are concerns that, while the 2012 budget has been limited, the EU's spending commitments have not been cut accordingly. The 2% increase for 2012 will take the budget up to 129bn euros (£110bn). But member state governments gave in to the European Parliament's demands to allow EU spending commitments to rise to 147bn euros. EU Budget Commissioner Janusz Lewandowski said this could lead to a hole in the accounts. "There is now a serious risk that the European Commission will run out of funds in the course of next year, and will therefore not be able to honour...

Gov. Tim Kaine yesterday announced a plan to expand health care coverage to thousands of uninsured, low-income Virginians as the state faces a projected $641 million budget shortfall. "One in seven Virginians still lack health insurance because their employers don"t provide it or because they cannot afford it," Mr. Kaine said. "As more citizens rely on our health care safety net for their most basic health needs, we must strengthen that system." Mr. Kaine, a Democrat, said the two-year budget that he plans to present to the General Assembly on Monday will include about $25.5 million in new health care...

Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton made a star turn this morning at former President Bill Clinton’s conference on global challenges, calling for a concerted attack on the “feminization of poverty” by destroying cultural, political, and economic barriers that trap women and children in desperate conditions. Before a standing-room-only audience in a ballroom of the Sheraton hotel in midtown Manhattan, Mrs. Clinton gave opening remarks at the conference session “Women and the Power of Economic Opportunity” then moderated a panel that included President Bush’s former secretary of agriculture and three leaders in the development and anti-poverty fields. “Far too many women are...

Americans continued earning more and spending more in February, according to a government report released yesterday, adding to other signs that the economy is recovering steadily from last year's slump. The Commerce Department reported that personal income rose 0.6 percent in February, the fourth consecutive month of increases. And consumers spent 0.6 percent more in February, continuing a three-month rise. Consumers continued spending at a healthy pace through most of last year, despite layoffs, uncertainty and the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks -- a key reason the recession was the mildest on record, economists say. But much of the strength of...