US committed to cutting its budget deficit, says Snow

The United States is committed to shrinking its budget deficits and agrees with India that all the major economies must help correct global imbalances, US Treasury Secretary John Snow said on Wednesday.
Speaking at a joint press conference with Indian Finance Minister Palaniappan Chidambaram, Snow said the US deficit in its financial year that ended on September 30 amounted to 2.6 percent of US total national output, only slightly above an average over the last 40 years of 2.4 percent.
"But it's not good enough. We know we got to bring that down significantly and are committed to do so," the US Treasury chief said after meetings with Indian legislators and with Chidambaram.
Snow is on a four-day visit to India, meeting businessmen in Mumbai before he came to New Delhi on Tuesday. He is scheduled to meet India's Prime Minister, Manmohan Singh, on Thursday and to address US and Indian business leaders where he is expected to urge India to pursue reforms to sustain growth.
Following the meeting between Snow and Chidambaram, the two sides issued a joint statement saying they concluded the global economic outlook "remains sound" but that it faces risks from costlier energy, rising interest rates and uneven growth.
The US Treasury has been giving special attention to key emerging-market economies like India, China and Brazil - each of which Snow has visited this year - urging them to press on with reforms that will give them greater potential for growth.
"Both sides pointed to the need to maintain global growth while reducing global current account imbalances," the joint statement said. "They noted that major economies have a shared responsibility to implement policies to reduce these imbalances."
Snow wants India to permit increased foreign ownership in its financial services sector, including in banking and insurance, suggesting it was one way that India could attract more investment from abroad, an area in which it lags other key emerging-market economies like China.
The US Treasury chief is in the forefront of a US drive to persuade China to expand upon the initial step it took in July of abandoning the peg between its yuan currency and the US dollar. Snow visited China last month to say it was time for Beijing to permit greater play for market forces in setting the yuan's value.
The statement issued after Wednesday's meeting referred indirectly to China again, saying currency flexibility was vital in the effort to bring global imbalances under control.