White House Blames Winter Weather for Potential Job Losses

The White House wants a do-over for February's yet-to-be released jobs numbers, arguing that the blizzards that hammered the country last month also dented the economic recovery.

Though the February unemployment figures are not out yet, White House economic adviser Larry Summers is already lowering expectations and claiming that winter weather is to blame for any posted decline.

In an interview with CNBC, Summers urged the country not to make any judgments about where the economy is headed based on the upcoming statistics.

"Who knows what the next number is going to be. The blizzards that affected much of the country during the last month are likely to distort the statistics, and in past blizzards those statistics have been distorted by 100,000 to 200,000 jobs, so it's going to be very important ... to look past whatever the next figures are to gauge the underlying trends," he said.

Summers has clearly noted the dismal weekly employment data that's come out and is bracing for some bad news at the end of the week.

The Commerce Department reported Thursday that new jobless benefits claims jumped by 22,000 during the prior week. The week before that, the number was 31,000. In the midst of all this, the East Coast was blanketed in record snowfall, with businesses -- as well as government -- losing revenue daily. At one point, the snow was so widespread that 49 of 50 states had snow on the ground.

The layoffs were attributed in part to the bad weather, which can cut into the construction workforce and other sectors. But the weather could hurt other areas. While many auto manufacturers, save for Toyota, reported having a good February, the storms appeared to dent sales in affected regions. General Motors reportedly saw a 22 percent decline in the Northeast.

The lowered expectations from Summers come just a couple weeks after the administration was raising them. On the one-year anniversary of the signing of the stimulus package, top officials said the second half of the spending package would act as a jobs engine.

Asked in one interview whether the "biggest bang" from the package has already been felt, economic adviser Christina Romer said: "Absolutely not."

Summers said in his latest interview that job growth is still on the way, even if Americans don't see any in February. He said the recovery is playing out in "stages" -- first GDP growth, then increased hours for those who already have jobs and then jobs creation.

"We've seen the GDP growth. We're starting to see the increased hours. The other stages in the process will come, but our problems weren't made in a day or a week or a year, and they won't be solved in a day or a week or a year," Summers said.

The economic vital signs in early 2010 seem as erratic and difficult to read as they did for much of last year.

After the jobless rate dropped from 10 percent to 9.7 percent for the month of January, the weekly statistics in February suggested that might turn back. Housing construction was better than expected in January, with the Commerce Department reporting new home construction rose 2.8 percent -- but new home sales hit a record low in January, dropping 11.2 percent, and existing home sales fell 7.2 percent, while overall construction spending dipped as well. Meanwhile, personal spending rose .5 percent in January, but incomes rose just .1 percent.

Complicating administration efforts to usher in some kind of sustained economic improvement, as well as pursue financial regulatory reform while tackling the deficit which hit $42.6 billion in January alone, is the fact that the executive economic team is still not fully in place.

At the Treasury Department, President Obama has not named anybody for five open positions, while three of the 18 people the president has nominated have not yet been confirmed.

The second-highest ranking official at the Federal Reserve, Donald Kohn, also announced this week he is stepping down at the end of his term in June, leaving three vacancies on the seven-member board. And there's more openings in the pipeline for top financial posts -- FDIC Chairwoman Sheila Bair's five-year term expires in a little over a year.