Geithner Defends Small Business Proposal
Feb. 2, 2010 -- Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner came to Capitol Hill today to pitch lawmakers on President Obama's $3.8 trillion budget, but found himself defending the administration's economic rescue measures against criticism from restless lawmakers on both sides of the aisle.
"This budget is designed to help make sure that Washington is creating the conditions that allow the private sector to grow and expand, that allow businesses, small and large, to create jobs and make investments," Geithner told the Senate Finance Committee at a hearing this morning.
Obama today is rolling out the latest in a series of proposals aimed at helping small businesses. The new measure would transfer $30 billion in repaid funds from the $700 billion Troubled Asset Relief Program to create a new small business lending fund to be distributed through around 8,000 community banks.
"For the average American, for many businesses, this is still the worst economic environment and most challenging economic environment they have ever experienced," Geithner said. "And that is true even though we have been successful in putting out this financial fire at the center of the system."
But a number of Democrats expressed skepticism that the administration's new small business initiative would work.
"There's a sense that perhaps there's not sufficient sense of urgency in the administration about getting assistance for small businesses and also for community banks, to get that program working better," said the panel's chairman Max Baucus, D-Mont.
"I continue to be uncertain with respect to how this new program is going to improve on two others that your department inspector general has criticized," stated Sen. Ron Wyden, D-Ore.
