Obama aide: "Hard to know" if 2009 recovery certain

By Alister Bull

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - One of U.S. President Barack Obama's top advisers said on Thursday she saw glimmers of hope that the economy was stabilizing, but it was still "hard to know" if a recovery would start this year as hoped.

"We expect the economy to level out in the second half of the year and then begin to recover," Christina Romer, chairwoman of the White House Council of Economic Advisers, said in prepared remarks.

"Whether the recovery begins later this year, as most private forecasters predict, or takes a bit longer is hard to know," she said in testimony prepared for delivery to the Joint Economic Committee of the U.S. Congress.

The U.S. economy contracted at a faster-than-expected annualized pace of 6.1 percent in the first quarter of 2009 as the worst recession in a generation hit jobs and spending.

The downturn has already cost more than 5 million jobs since it began in late 2007. Romer said unemployment will continue to rise in the months ahead.

SOME 'HOPE' IN JOBS AND HOUSING

But it was not all bad news.

She told reporters after the hearing that she was encouraged by weekly jobless data on Thursday that showed new claims unexpectedly declining and a closely watched four-week average of fresh applications for jobless benefits drop for the third straight week.