国际英语新闻:Obama calls for debt reduction in balanced manner

WASHINGTON, Nov. 9 (Xinhua) -- The United States should cut its mounting public debt in a balanced manner with a plan including both government spending cuts and revenue increases, U.S. President Barack Obama said on Friday.

"We can't just cut our way to prosperity," Obama said at a press conference held on Friday in the White House.

The nation's wealthiest had to pay more taxes to help solve the government's fiscal challenge, and the debt reduction efforts should not hinder U.S. economic growth pace, he noted.

"I am open to compromise," stressed Obama, adding that he would oppose any debt reduction plan to avert the "fiscal cliff" that did not ask the wealthy to pay more taxes.

Obama's remarks came prior to the looming fiscal challenge facing the world's largest economy. Unless U.S. Congress acts by the end of this year, a combination of tax hikes and sweeping spending cuts, dubbed as the "fiscal cliff" and with the combined amount of about 600 billion U. S. dollars, was set to kick in.

Obama on Friday did not provide enough specifics on tax increase and government spending cut proposals.

In a dueling press conference held earlier Friday, John Boehner, Speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives, said that he opposed higher tax rates to solve the nation's fiscal challenge, citing a study from Ernst & Young that raising the income tax rates for the wealthy would destroy nearly 700,000 jobs in the country.