Unemployment Insurance
The New Direction Congress is committed to providing much-needed relief to 3.5 million unemployed workers to assist them with rapidly rising gas and food costs, while they continue to struggle to find work in the slowing economy. On June 12, 2008, the House passed the Emergency Extended Unemployment Compensation Act, H.R. 5749, by a vote of 274-137, a margin large enough to override a threatened veto by President Bush.
Watch Speaker Pelosi speak in support of the legislation:
Democrats in Congress have pushed to extend unemployment benefits since the beginning of the year, as the economy weakened, but have faced continued resistance from the Bush Administration. Even with the biggest one-month jump in the unemployment rate in two decades, and huge job losses in the airline and auto industry among others, White House Press Secretary Dana Perino said “…no administration has increased or extended unemployment benefits while unemployment was this low.” [Detroit News, 6/7/08] America’s workers and families can wait no longer, and neither will this Congress.
Relief to America’s Workers, Effective Stimulus for the Economy
- H.R. 5749, the Emergency Extended Unemployment Compensation Act, will immediately provide up to 13 weeks of extended unemployment benefits in every state to workers exhausting the 26 weeks of regular unemployment benefits.
- In states with higher levels of unemployment (six percent or higher), an additional 13 weeks would be available, for a total of 26 weeks of extended benefits.
- Relief would run through March 2009 and benefit 3.5 million Americans. [Congressional Budget Office]
- Federal unemployment trust funds, which have more than enough reserves to cover the cost, will finance these benefits.
- Extending these benefits is one of the most cost-effective and fast-acting ways to stimulate the economy because the money is spent quickly, according to the Congressional Budget Office. Every $1 spent on unemployment benefits generates $1.64 in new economic demand. [Mark Zandi, chief economist of Moody’s Economy.com, 1/22/08]
Need for Immediate Action is Real
- The unemployment rate surged to 5.5 percent from 5.0 percent -- the biggest one-month jump in more than two decades (since February 1986) and climbing to the highest level in nearly four years (October 2004). The unemployment rate is now a full percentage point higher than a year ago.
- For five our consecutive months, the U.S. economy has lost jobs, totaling 324,000. The number of people looking for work climbed 861,000 to 8.5 million in May.
- Nearly one in five jobless workers (1.6 million) is long-term unemployed (jobless for more than 26 weeks).
- The airline industry has eliminated 22,000 jobs so far this year, more than in all of 2007, most recently at Continental (3,000 jobs) and United (up to 1,600 jobs), and the automobile industry continues to face job cuts, leading industries with announced layoffs in May with over 30,000.
- The number of long-term unemployed Americans is higher now than when Congress last extended unemployment benefits in 2002.