Tag Archives: U.S. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen

U.S. Treasury Secretary Yellen warns Congress on debt limit

WASHINGTON (Reuters) -U.S. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen urged lawmakers on Friday to increase or suspend the nation’s debt limit as soon as possible and warned that if Congress does not act by Aug. 2, the Treasury Department will need to take “extraordinary measures” to prevent a U.S. default.

As a partisan fight over raising the debt ceiling erupted in Congress, Yellen told House of Representatives Speaker Nancy Pelosi in a letter that the outstanding debt of the United States will be at the statutory limit on Aug 1.

“Today, Treasury is announcing that it will suspend the sale of State and Local Government Series (SLGS) securities at 12:00 p.m. on July 30, 2021,” Yellen said in the letter, also sent to other congressional leaders from both parties.

The suspension will continue until the debt ceiling is suspended or raised, Yellen said.

“If Congress has not acted to suspend or increase the debt limit by Monday, August 2, 2021, Treasury will need to start taking certain additional extraordinary measures in order to prevent the United States from defaulting on its obligations,” Yellen added.

A failure to work out differences over whether government spending cuts should accompany an increase in the statutory debt limit, currently set at $28.5 trillion, could lead to a federal government shutdown – as has happened three times in the past decade – or even a debt default.

(Reporting by Doina Chiacu and Susan Heavey; Editing by Franklin Paul and Will Dunham)

Yellen says more work needed to shore up weaknesses revealed by pandemic

By Andrea Shalal and David Lawder

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – U.S. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen said a rapid recovery in the United States would boost overall global growth, but more work was needed to shore up weaknesses the COVID-19 crisis exposed in the non-bank financial sector, global supply chains and the social safety net.

Yellen on Tuesday told leaders of the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank that the Biden administration had decided to “go big” with its COVID-19 response to avert the negative “scarring” impact of long-lasting unemployment, adding that she hoped the U.S. economy would return to full employment next year.

Speaking during the IMF and World Bank spring meetings, Yellen said the crisis had dealt a huge blow worldwide, and it was the responsibility of advanced economies to ensure that years of progress in reducing poverty were not reversed by the crisis.

“We are going to be careful to learn the lessons of the (global) financial crisis, which is: ‘Don’t withdraw support too quickly,'” Yellen said, “And we would encourage all those developed countries that have the capacity… to continue to support a global recovery for the sake of the growth in the entire global economy.”

Yellen said she hoped global finance officials make progress on approving a new allocation of the IMF’s emergency reserve, or Special Drawing Rights, during the meeting, and said it was critical to tackle global debt issues exacerbated by the crisis.

She also underscored the Biden Administration’s commitment to tackling climate change at home and ensuring the needed “transfer of resources” to enable similar actions in developing countries.

“We need to make sure that we help developing countries meet their climate goals along with their development objectives. And the availability of green finance is critical to that,” she said, noting that addressing climate change would also bring opportunities for investment to the private sector.

Yellen said it was critical to ensure the world was better prepared for the next global health crisis, citing the need to improve the resilience of supply chains and social safety nets around the world.

She said the core banking sector had been strengthened after the 2008-2009 financial crisis, but some areas in the non-bank financial sector “showed tremendous stress” during the pandemic and would require attention.

(Reporting by Andrea Shalal and David Lawder; Editing by Chris Reese and Dan Grebler)

Yellen says COVID-19 having ‘extremely unfair’ impact on women’s income, jobs

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The COVID-19 pandemic has had an “extremely unfair” impact on the income and economic opportunities of women, U.S. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen said on Monday, calling for long-term measures to improve labor market conditions for women.

Yellen, in a dialogue with International Monetary Fund chief Kristalina Georgieva, said it was critical to address the risk that the pandemic would leave permanent scars, reducing the prospects for women in the workplace and the economy.

She noted that women’s participation in the workforce was already lower in the United States before the pandemic than in Europe, another issue that needed to be addressed.

“I think it’s absolutely tragic, the impact that this crisis has had on women, especially low-skilled women and minorities,” Yellen said, noting that while people at the top of the economic scale had continued to do well, those nearer the bottom, who had already been struggling, had been hardest hit.

“It is an extremely unfair thing that’s happened,” Yellen said, noting that women as a group had experienced far greater job losses since they had been disproportionately represented in the service sector and many had dropped out of the labor force to care for children, who were out of school.

“We’re really concerned about scarring, permanent scarring, from this crisis,” she said, adding her hope that President Joe Biden’s $1.9 trillion relief bill would help get the labor market back on track this year or next.

The goal, she said, was to avoid the decade-long gap seen before the labor market recovered after the global financial crisis of 2008-2009.

As of January, women accounted for slightly more than half of the 10 million jobs lost during the coronavirus crisis, even though they typically make up a little less than half the U.S. work force.

More than 2.5 million women left the labor force between February 2020 and January of this year, compared to 1.8 million men.

In the longer-term, Yellen said it was critical to improve the conditions facing women in the labor market, including lack of benefits, paid leave for family emergencies and child care.

“These are things that we are going to address over time,” she said.

(Reporting by Andrea Shalal and David Lawder; Editing by Chizu Nomiyama and Andrea Ricci)

U.S. Senate Democrats prepare to push through Biden’s $1.9 trillion COVID-19 package

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Democrats in the U.S. Senate were poised on Thursday to take a first step toward President Joe Biden’s $1.9 trillion COVID-19 relief proposal, in a marathon “vote-a-rama” session aimed at overriding Republican opposition to the package.

Senate Democrats need to pass a budget resolution to unlock a legislative tool called reconciliation, which would allow them to approve Biden’s proposal in the narrowly divided chamber with a simple majority. The House of Representatives approved the budget measure on Wednesday.

Most legislation must get at least 60 votes in the 100-seat Senate to pass. But the chamber is divided 50-50 and Republicans oppose the Democratic president’s proposal. Reconciliation would allow the Senate’s 48 Democrats and two independents to approve the relief package with a tie-breaking vote from Vice President Kamala Harris.

Senate Democrats and the Biden administration have left the door open to Republican participation but have said they want comprehensive legislation to move quickly to address a pandemic that has killed over 450,000 Americans and left millions more jobless.

“Seeing long lines of people waiting to get food around the country is something we should never see in the United States,” U.S. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen said on ABC News’ “Good Morning America” program.

“This is really an urgent need. And we need to act big. We need to make sure that we provide a bridge so that people aren’t scarred indefinitely by this crisis,” she said.

But the Democrats’ march to add more assistance to last year’s $4 trillion in coronavirus relief could be complicated by the impeachment trial of Republican former President Donald Trump, which is set to begin next week and could distract from the legislation.

Once adopted, the budget resolution would provide spending instructions to House and Senate committees charged with crafting COVID-19 relief legislation.

The reconciliation measure is not a piece of legislation and does not require the president’s signature to take effect. If the Senate passes it without amendments, it will take effect immediately. If any amendments pass, the package would return to the House, which would need to vote on it again.

In show of bipartisanship, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, a Democrat, this week pledged that consideration of the budget resolution would be open to amendments from both parties in a process known informally as a “vote-a-rama,” which could run to late Thursday night or early Friday.

“We invite participation from both sides of the aisle,” Schumer on Thursday. “But I urge members not to lose sight of what this legislation will mean for the American people.”

Republicans expect to offer up to 20 amendments on issues ranging from energy and federal land use to executive orders.

(Reporting by David Morgan and Susan Heavey; Editing by Scott Malone and Jonathan Oatis)