Geithner admits job losses 'deeply unfair'

U.S. Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner said Thursday it's "deeply unfair" that Wall Street banks bailed out by taxpayers are in better shape from the recession than millions of ordinary Americans.

Geithner's comments came in the face of public outrage by Americans that Washington protected high-risk banks and investment houses, even as the national unemployment rate was soaring to double-digit levels for the first time in a generation.

But in a nationally broadcast interview, Geithner also argued that there was little choice for President Barack Obama when confronted with a financial crisis.

"As the president has said, we had to do some very unpopular things," Geithner said.

"It's not fair. It's deeply unfair," he said. "He [Obama] had to decide whether he was going to act to fix it or stand back ... and that would have been calamitous for the American economy."

Geithner also said the White House is "very worried" about regaining the more than eight million jobs lost in the recession, but said he expects the economy "is going to start creating jobs again." The national jobless rate in the U.S. is now 9.7 per cent.

The secretary agreed that rate is "still terribly high and is going to stay unacceptably high for a very long time" because of the recession.

"Just because this was the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression," Geithner said, "a huge amount of damage was done to businesses and families across the country ... and it's going to take us a long time to heal that damage. "

Geithner said he hopes skeptical voters will note legislation moving through Congress to reform the financial system.

"What happened in our country should never happen again," he said.

"People were paid for taking enormous risks. It was a crazy way to run a financial system," Geithner said. "It's the government's job ... to do a better job of restraining that kind of risk-taking."