Washington: US President Barack Obama Sarturday renewed his pledge to make job creation his top priority in 2010 but said it was also critical to rein in a record budget deficit that threatened economic recovery.
Obama used his weekly radio and internet address to remind Americans of the various proposals he put forward in the last week to spur job growth and tame a $1.4 trillion (Dh5.13 trillion) deficit.
The White House has said Obama is still committed to a promise he made last year to halve the deficit by the end of his term in 2013. But in his radio address, he talked only of "reining" in the deficit.
Obama is due Monday to unveil his proposed budget for fiscal 2011 that begins October 1, and has said it will include a three-year spending freeze on some domestic programmes.
"We'll launch an unprecedented effort to root out waste, inefficiency, and unnecessary spending in our government, and every American will be able to see how and where we spend taxpayer dollars," Obama said.
Top priority
A Pew Research Centre study published last week showed 60 per cent of those polled viewed reducing the budget deficit as a top priority for 2010, up from 53 per cent in 2009.
Obama acknowledged these concerns in his address. "As we work to create jobs, it is critical that we rein in the budget deficits we've been accumulating for far too long — deficits that won't just burden our children and grandchildren, but could damage our markets, drive up our interest rates, and jeopardise our recovery right now," he said.
The size of the deficit is a political hot potato in an election year, with Republicans seeking to paint Obama as a big spender and the White House countering that the president inherited a $1.3 trillion deficit when he took office.
