Obama Redirecting Economy; Summers: Switch from Spending to Producing

Byline: Patrice Hill, THE WASHINGTON TIMES

The Obama administration hopes to reshape the U.S. economy to be less dependent on consumer spending and debt for growth while increasing the role of manufacturing and exports, the White House's top economic adviser said in a much-anticipated speech Friday.

Appearing before the Peterson Institute for International Economics in Washington, Lawrence H. Summers, head of the White House National Economic Council, suggested the administration is using the sharply increased role that the government gained as it sought to address multiple crises unfolding when President Obama took office as an occasion to try to change the direction of the economy in the future.

The government already was playing a major role in propping up banks and the financial system when Mr. Obama took office. Since then, the president has staged a …

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Publication information: Article title: Obama Redirecting Economy; Summers: Switch from Spending to Producing. Contributors: Not available. Newspaper title: The Washington Times (Washington, DC). Publication date: July 18, 2009. Page number: A01. © 2009 The Washington Times LLC. COPYRIGHT 2009 Gale Group.

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