President Obama visited Maryland today to speak on proposals to help small businesses prosper, and in turn creating job opportunities to help alleviate the current unemployment concerns.

During a press conference call, Christina Romer (President's Council of Economic Advisers) and Karen Mills (Small Business Administrator) discuss President Obama's plans to excite growth within small businesses and decrease unemployment.

Unemployment rate has come down 3/10 of a percentage point from 10.0 percent to 9.7 percent, according to the U.S. Department of Labor.

“The president's focus now is giving small firms incentive to continue to hire now and not later,” Romer (pictured left) said, “one way of doing this is lending.”

Mills said there are banks who have been lenders to small businesses, but now they don't have enough capital and they don't want to take on the risk of lending at this time, despite the economy's progress.

This article appears in Feb 3-9, 2010.