Obama: Tax cuts begin Saturday

WASHINGTON, Feb. 21 (UPI) -- U.S. President Barack Obama says employers will begin Saturday to reduce the amount of tax withheld for 95 percent of payroll employees.

In his weekly radio address Saturday, the president said the average U.S. working family will keep an addition $65 per month by April 1. He said the tax cut, part of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act he signed into law Tuesday, is being delivered more quickly than any other tax cut in U.S. history.

"Because of this plan, three and a half million Americans will now go to work doing the work that America needs done," Obama said. "I am grateful to the Congress, governors and mayors across the country and to all of you, whose support made this critical step possible."

Obama said the legislation will result in new construction, road building and repair and work on restoring substandard levees and dams. He said the legislation was "only a first step on the road to economic recovery" and that recovery "will require stemming the spread of foreclosures and falling home values, and doing all we can to help responsible homeowners stay in their homes, which is exactly what the housing plan I announced last week will help us do."

The president said the banking system needs to be stabilized and repaired, the credit freeze has to be solved and "the broken regulatory system that made this crisis possible" has to be reformed.

"But I'm confident that we, as a people, have the strength and wisdom to carry out this strategy and overcome this crisis," he said.