Top Forecaster Brown Sees U.S. Adding 2 Million Jobs in 2011 – Bloomberg

This is good news…

The U.S. economy will create 2 million jobs in 2011, twice as many as last year, said Scott Brown, the most accurate forecaster of the jobless rate over the past two years according to Bloomberg News calculations.

Unemployment will end the year at 8.6 percent, projected Brown, chief economist at Raymond James & Associates Inc., less than the 8.8 percent median forecast of 61 economists surveyed by Bloomberg from Feb. 2 to Feb. 8. It dropped to 9 percent in January from 9.4 percent the prior month.

President Barack Obama’s deal with congressional Republicans to reduce the payroll tax and extend Bush-era cuts will put more money in Americans’ pockets and spur demand, said Brown. The need to rebuild inventories as sales climb will give the world’s largest economy an added lift this year, he said.

“We’ll see consumer spending remaining pretty strong,” Brown said in a telephone interview from St. Petersburg, Florida. “Firms large and small won’t hire unless they see more demand.”

via Top Forecaster Brown Sees U.S. Adding 2 Million Jobs in 2011 – Bloomberg.