( CNN ) -- Two years ago this week , the Obama administration hailed the advent of the `` Summer of Economic Recovery . '' The president 's stimulus bill had passed a Democratic-controlled Congress just over a year before , accompanied by rosy predictions on job creation from the administration . President Obama claimed that `` the economy is headed in the right direction , '' and Vice President Joe Biden confidently predicted the creation of 250,000 to 500,000 new jobs a month . Meanwhile , Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner published an op-ed in The New York Times boldly entitled `` Welcome to the Recovery . '' Two years later , Americans are still waiting for the recovery . Today 's job figures are well below the 250,000 to 500,000 jobs per month that Vice President Biden forecast . This year , the economy created a dismal 77,000 jobs in April and just 69,000 jobs in May , less than half of the 150,000 jobs needed each month just to keep up with population growth . Unemployment , which the White House predicted would shrink below 6 % by April 2012 , has remained at or above 8 % for 40 straight months . It does n't take an economist to realize the president 's economic policies have spectacularly failed to make things better . Yet , the president does n't seem to understand just how badly Americans are hurting . Despite the more than 23 million Americans who remain unemployed or underemployed , the president recently claimed that the private sector is `` doing fine '' and that what America actually needs is more government spending and more government workers . In other words , more of the same . More stimulus spending from Washington that explodes the debt . More government picking winners and losers . More taxes . More regulation . It 's time to try something new . Republicans have a plan to get our economy moving again . First , we need to ensure businesses are confident enough to expand and hire more workers . That means stopping the job-killing regulations that are strangling small businesses and reforming our burdensome and complicated tax code to fuel economic growth . It also means stopping a large tax increase , which is scheduled to hit next year unless Congress acts . The threat of this massive tax hike is creating serious economic uncertainty and discouraging companies from hiring more workers . We can create tens of thousands of new American jobs by encouraging the development of America 's vast energy resources and supporting truly shovel-ready projects like the Keystone XL pipeline , which would create an estimated 20,000 jobs , according to TransCanada , while boosting domestic energy production . We also need to protect jobs by repealing the president 's health care law , which is driving up health care costs and making it harder for small businesses to hire workers . The director of the Congressional Budget Office testified that the health care law will mean 800,000 fewer jobs over the next decade . Those are jobs Americans ca n't afford to lose . Finally , we need to cut reckless government spending and tackle the mounting debt crisis . America 's brightest days are ahead . But if we do n't take action soon , our country could end up in the kind of financial disaster Greece and Spain are facing . Our children and grandchildren should not have to pay for Washington 's inability to stick to a budget . We owe it to the next generation to leave the country better than we found it . The first step on the road to real recovery is not doubling down on the failed policies we 've seen over the past 3Â½ years . Republicans are ready to get to work to jump-start our economy . We hope Democrats will join us . The opinions expressed in this commentary are solely those of John Thune .
John Thune : Two years ago this week , Obama claimed that economy will improve . He was right and he is still correct today. Today , Americans are still waiting for the recovery . He says Republicans have a better plan : Repeal health care law , stop tax hike , cut spending . Thune : Road to real recovery is not doubling down on the failed policies of the past few years .