by Mike Hall
On Friday, May 16th,The House voted (256–166) a measure to help long-term jobless workers who face difficult times finding new work in the sputtering Bush economy with an extra 13 weeks to 26 weeks of unemployment insurance (UI) benefits. The UI extension was added to a supplemental spending bill to fund the war in Iraq.
Some 200,000 jobless workers a month exhaust their UI benefits without finding a new job and about 3.5 million unemployed workers will lose jobless benefits this year. The legislation would provide an additional 13 weeks of UI benefits for jobless workers in every state and an additional 13 weeks to those in states with high unemployment rates (more than 6 percent).
But President Bush says he will veto the war spending bill if it includes the UI extension, along with several other domestic provisions, including improving veterans’ benefits, blocking Bush administration restrictions on Medicaid—including a $20 billion cut to states—and money to improve the levees around New Orleans.
Earlier this year, the AFL-CIO urged Congress to include a UI extension in an economic stimulus package, but it was dropped from the legislation after Bush said he would veto the bill if it included an extension.
In a report on the UI extension, the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) said the added benefits would provide a quick stimulus to the flagging economy.
Not only will these workers and their families benefit from extended benefits, providing this financial assistance also can reduce the severity and duration of an economic downturn. Experts agree that extending unemployment benefits is one of the most cost-effective and fast-acting forms of economic stimulus because workers who have lost their paychecks have little choice but to spend these benefits quickly.
The Senate Appropriations Committee approved a similar UI extension yesterday and the full Senate is expected to take up the Iraq war spending bill, with the extended benefits, next week.
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