When President Barack Obama addresses a joint session of Congress on Thursday, he will face a business community both desperate for a boost in ailing sales and deeply skeptical of the government's ability to help.
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Bloomberg NewsBob Greifeld, CEO, Nasdaq-OMX: 'U.S. companies need the ability to recruit the best workers....We must increase the number of H-1B visas available and reform the employment-based green card process.'



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CEOs Call for Better Infrastructure



Journal Community





Pressure on politicians to act is growing. By any measure, the job market's recovery has been weak. Last Friday, the Labor Department reported that on balance no new U.S. jobs were created in August, the worst showing since last September, and well below the 125,000 needed to keep up with population growth. The White House's own projections call for unemployment to average 9% through 2012.
According to a recent Wall Street Journal/NBC News poll, more than 70% of Americans think the economy has yet to hit bottom. Without action from Congress, two economic-stimulus programs—a payroll-tax holiday for workers and emergency unemployment-insurance benefits—will expire by year-end, causing a loss of 750,000 jobs in 2012, according to an estimate by Moody's Analytics.
"The labor market has shown absolutely no recovery," said Harvard University economist Lawrence Katz. "There's no scenario in which the labor market doesn't continue to need help three to four years from now."
The Journal talked to four groups of people who analyze hiring and hire workers themselves. Here are their views about how to spur job creation:
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Associated PressCarlos Ghosn, CEO, Renault, Nissan: 'The first would be research and development, promoted both publicly and through companies' investments in R&D....The second would be the development of infrastructure.'



Chief Executives
Chief executives of some of the world's largest corporations support repairs to aging infrastructure, financed in part by private money, and point to lower taxes and fewer...