- AIG Board OKs CEO Pay; Benmosche Agrees to Stay
- Obama Reiterates Commitment to Boost US-India Ties
- FDIC's Bair Cautions on Risks in Bank Break-Up Plan
- Wednesday's Economic News Crunch Could Tilt Markets
- Call Me Crazy: Confessions of a Black Friday Shopper
- 'Very Blah' Christmas Is Coming for UK Retailers
- US Firms Hit by Payroll Taxes at Exactly the Wrong Time
- Citi Mortgage Reveals Something the US Treasury Won't
- In Time for Holidays: More Gloom and Doom on Economy
- Citi Mortgage Reveals What Treasury Won't
- S&P to Hit 1,200 by Year-End: Chief Investor
- Amended Berkshire Hathaway Filing Indicates No Secret Stock Stakes at End of Q3
- Facebook's Biggest-Ever Holiday Shopping Season
- Facebook's New Dual Class Structure - Slow Steps to an IPO
- 5 Big Bank Stocks Investors Should Consider: Strategists
- Gambling Drunk, Texting to Live And America's On Sale - Your Emails
- Nov. 24: Unusual Volume Leaders
- NBA D-League On The Rise
MOST SHARED
- Wednesday's Economic News Crunch Could Tilt Markets
- The 'Real' Jobless Rate: 17.5% Of Workers Are Unemployed
- The Social Media Gaming Threat
- NBA D-League On The Rise
- Obama Reiterates Commitment to Boost US-India Ties
- Stifling Anger at Work Can Kill, Survey Finds
- Australia Wheat Exporters Face Challenges: GrainCorp
- Japan Export Rebound Eases Fear of New Recession
Text Size 
The U.S. economy isn't likely to recover until "well into 2010," Wilbur Ross, chairman and CEO of WL Ross & Co., said Monday.
"The consumer still has not been rehabilitated" and that's the big problem halting the return to growth, given that the consumer used to be almost 70 percent of the U.S. economy, Ross told "Squawk Box."
It's doubtful that the government's stimulus package will boost growth anytime soon and called for the White House to the renew the Term-Asset Backed Securities Loan Facility (TALF) program as it expires in coming months.
"I don't see how we can do without it," Ross said.
The recent increase in the savings rate was a positive for the long term, but for the economy in the near term it was problematic as the consumer is cutting spending on products which may help with the economy's healing, he said.
If the savings rate goes to 8 or 10 percent and stays there, that would be "a really serious thing because the only thing to offset it whatever the government does," he said.
"We're going to be heading toward France, except without the wine," Ross said, citing how liabilities are being shifted from an overleveraged consumer to the government.
"The housing market certainly hasn't stopped going down. And to me, the $6 trillion destruction in people's net worth, in and of itself, is a big deterrent to spending. The banks are still not making loans," Ross told CNBC, adding that he sees that the asset-backed commercial paper market has been "partly rehabilitated."
Print
Email
- Remember when auto shows were major events where new models could generate buzz?
- CNBC’s Mike Huckman visits a cutting-edge plant to see how the flu vaccine of the future is being made.
- People who bottle up their anger at work are up to five times more likely to suffer a heart attack, a study found.
- Playboy will outsource its publishing operations in a bid to become profitable again.
- A new McDonald's in Manhattan is the nation's first to sport a sleek, chic interior imported from stores in London and Paris.
- For nearly three decades, these on-call experts have been dishing advice on how to – and not to – cook turkey.
Data is a real-time snapshot *Data is delayed at least 15 minutes