A fundamental part of President Obama’s strategy to energize our economy is making smart investments in research and technology to create jobs for American workers. Today, the President will be visiting the Johnson Controls advanced battery manufacturing plant in Holland, MI to highlight the key role that innovative technologies will play in the future of […]
Last week, I joined the President's Council on Jobs and Competitiveness for a discussion in Silicon Valley on the importance of high growth companies to job creation in the US. On Friday, my travels to Blacksburg, VA, on behalf of the White House Rural Council, validated three key messages discussed earlier in the week with the […]
Dr. Jill Biden and the US officials who joined her on a trip to a refugee center in Kenya want the American people to understand how severe the crisis caused by a combination of drought, famine and war has become, especially on the most vulnerable population, the children of Somalia. “It touched my heart,” said Dr. […]
President Obama today will announce new fuel efficiency standards that will save American businesses that operate and own commercial vehicles approximately $50 billion in fuel costs over the life of the program. These work trucks, buses, and other medium- and heavy duty vehicleswill be required to meet fuel efficiency and greenhouse gas emission standards for the […]
Ed. Note: Cross-posted from the USAID Impact blog. Eighty kilometers from Kenya’s border with Somalia, the Dadaab Refugee Complex—already the world’s largest refugee camp—has seen on average 1,500 exhausted and starving men, women and children arrive each day. Fleeing from famine that is now gripping a large portion of southern Somalia largely inaccessible to aid […]
Ed. Note: Cross-posted with the Fast Lane. At the Department of Transportation we have been working to encourage safer, more innovative, and more cost effective ways to move goods across our nation’s highways. Today, President Obama introduced one more step toward that goal. “While we were working to improve the efficiency of cars and light-duty […]
Ed note: This article is being cross-posted from the Department of Labor's Work in Progress blog I know communities that have faced hard times. I grew up in one. I’ve lived in one, and until last week I was the mayor of one. Helping my community get back on its feet has been my passion for as […]
Click here to see the video. This afternoon, while speaking to the press from the State Dining Room, President Obama addressed the news from Friday that the United States received a downgrade by one of the credit rating agencies: The fact is, we didn’t need a rating agency to tell us that we need a balanced, long-term approach […]
The President today outlined a series of steps Congress can take to quickly add momentum to our nation's economic growth. Click on the links below to find out more about how each of these proposals can help propel our economy forward: Extend the payroll tax cut so that middle class families have more money in their paychecks […]
When I was superintendent in Chicago, I never looked forward to a call from Washington telling me what I have to do. Now that I'm in Washington, I try not to make those calls. Our job is to support reform that is good for students at the state and local level. We need to get […]
