Vice President Joseph Biden on Sunday defended a 787-billion-dollar stimulus package adopted to jump-start the troubled U.S. economy but acknowledged that recovery is a long way off.
"We still have a long way to go, but clearly we are closer to recovery today than we were in January," Biden wrote in an op-ed piece in The New York Times. "The Recovery Act has been critical to that progress."
The package, which Congress passed and President Obama signed into law this year, combines government-funded infrastructure projects with tax relief and assistance to those affected by the slump.
But it has been under fire from Republicans who dubbed it inefficient and wasteful.
"But the way I see it, our balanced approach recognizes that there is no silver bullet, no single thing, that can address the many and complex needs of America's vast economy," Biden wrote.
"We need relief, recovery and reinvestment to cope with our multifaceted crisis — and only 159 days after it was signed by President Obama, the Recovery Act is already at work providing all three."
Copyright AFP 2008, AFP stories and photos shall not be published, broadcast, rewritten for broadcast or publication or redistributed directly or indirectly in any medium