Less than 24 hours after convening a summit to generate ideas on how the government can spur job growth, the White House received some encouraging unemployment news. New figures from the Labor Department show that because of minimal job losses in November (just 11,000, compared to a three-month average of 135,000) , the national unemployment rate dipped from 10.2 to 10 percent. Economists are calling it the best employment report since the recession began two years ago.

Still, it's far too early to assume that the improvements will be sustained. The huge jump between September and October was actually exaggerated at the time, so the drop this month can be partly explained as a correction to a previous sampling error. The rate was also impacted by continued decline in the size of the labor force, which shrunk by 100,000. And there are still 5.9 million long-term unemployed workers nationwide, many of whom will exhaust their unemployment benefits next month and will lose subsidies to pay for their health insurance. It's clear that more investment is needed.

While Sen. Dick Durbin is busy readying a jobs bill in the Senate, Rep. Phil Hare is hoping to float some of his own ideas in the lower chamber. In a column for Politico yesterday, the Quad Cities Democrat argued that too many of his colleagues in Washington "seem hesitant to take the truly bold action necessary" to rebuild an economy devastated by "disastrous trade policies, reckless deregulation, a trillion-dollar misadventure in Iraq, and massive tax cuts for the wealthy." His solution? Pass the surface transportation authorization bill, offer tax credits to small businesses expanding their workforce, and invest in a new government works program:

Second, I intend to introduce the New Deal for a New Economy Act, legislation that creates a hybrid of Roosevelt’s WPA and an expanded version of the Conservation Corps of the 1970s. This bill will authorize a multiyear grant program administered by the Department of Labor to provide funding for the creation of resource management positions on federal and state lands, public works projects on the state and local level, and public interest work with community-based nonprofit organizations. This legislation would provide a lifeline to the many Americans who find themselves out of work and out of hope.

It's a breath of fresh air to see Hare write truthfully about the importance of government investment in spite of constant Beltway pressure to focus in on the national deficit. It's ideas like these that should carry the day until the economy gets back to strength.