WASHINGTON, Dec. 12 (UPI) -- A top White House economic adviser said Sunday the tax package, despite "bitter pills," will help revive the economy and reduce unemployment.
Appearing on NBC's "Meet the Press," Austan Goolsbee, chairman of the President's Council of Economic Advisers, said, "I understand the feeling that it's a bitter pill to swallow the high-income tax cuts, but what the president was able to get is substantially bigger than that."
He pointed to "incentives for investments for firms … a payroll tax cut for 155 million workers, money for college education, et cetera."
Goolsbee said, "All private forecasters agree that … this package … would significantly raise the growth rate of the United States in the coming year if we were to pass it and get the unemployment rate down and jobs created more than they thought before that. And if you let these tax cuts expire, which they will in 20 days if we do nothing, I think that would be a serious blow to the economy. Everybody agrees on that."
