Kerry investing 2 weeks in economy blitz

WASHINGTON -- John Kerry's presidential campaign on Monday kicked off two weeks of focusing on the economy with a battery of statistics that aides say show there's good reason many voters don't feel as if the economy is improving.

The advisers said people are not optimistic because of slow job growth over the past 12 months, mediocre new jobs, wage stagnation and increases in costs for essentials. Among the statistics offered from federal agencies and private foundations to bolster their case:

1.6 million households filed for bankruptcy in 2003, 33 percent more than in 2000.

1.8 million people have been jobless for more than six months, the longest long-term unemployment since 1984.

The typical family health insurance premium has gone up $2,630 since 2000, college tuition is up $1,207 per year and child care costs $2,050 a year for a two-child family.

"Voters understand the economy in much broader terms than job statistics. The economy is the life that they're leading," said strategist Tad Devine.

Kerry starts a two-week focus on economic issues Tuesday with a speech to the New Jersey AFL-CIO in Atlantic City. Trips to Ohio and Michigan are also on his schedule. His economic plan includes a new manufacturing tax credit, a state tax relief and education fund and a corporate tax cut financed by eliminating breaks for U.S. companies that send jobs overseas and shelter profits there. He would also reduce health insurance costs for companies by having the federal government shoulder catastrophic illness costs above $50,000.

President Bush's campaign calls the Kerry trip his "pessimism and misery tour."

"Sen. Kerry ignores the good economic news and plays to people's fears and anxieties," campaign spokesman Steve Schmidt said in an e- mail.

Bush's campaign released statistics showing job creation and unemployment rates for January to May comparable to those under Bill Clinton in the first five months of 1996: about 5.6 percent unemployment and about 233,000 jobs added per month.

But economist Gene Sperling, a Kerry adviser, said the 12-month job creation average for Bush is 112,000 per month. He said Bush is 7 million jobs short of what his own aides predicted using standards of a recovery.

Sperling said Bush could have helped create more jobs if he hadn't focused on tax cuts weighted toward the well-off. He said recent improvements won't change perceptions or reality: "If you get D- minuses for three and a half years in college, one semester with a B- minus doesn't put you on the honor roll."

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