WASHINGTON -- Unemployed workers across the country will have one fewer thing to be thankful for tomorrow-Congress ended its session yesterday without extending the federal jobless benefits program that is scheduled to end on December 21. Unless Congress reauthorizes the program on its final day in session in December, more than 2.1 million workers will be denied federal jobless aid over the next six months as they continue to struggle in a labor market that has yet to replace more than 2.4 million lost jobs lost over the last two and a half years, according to the National Employment Law Project.
For the second year in a row, Congress has left millions of families to face the holidays without the extra security of the extended jobless benefits. The move comes despite evidence that long-term joblessness is worse now than when the program was first created in March 2002. Meanwhile, at the other end of Pennsylvania Avenue, President Bush has remained shamefully silent on the issue.
"Apparently the President and some members Congress believe that two weeks of positive economic news is enough to assuage the needs of 8.8 million unemployed Americans," said Maurice Emsellem, policy director of the National Employment Law Project. "Their willful ignorance of the facts is sadly out of touch with the needs of our nation's jobless."
House and Senate Republicans opposed legislation endorsed by Democrats and Republicans from several high unemployment states that would have extended and improved the program. Senator John Ensign (R-NV) blocked a final effort by fellow Republican Gordon Smith (R-OR) yesterday, comparing the unemployed with welfare recipients and claiming that unemployment is less serious now than it was when Congress ended a similar program after the 1991 recession.
Senator Ensign chose to ignore the fact that only one job is currently available for every three unemployed Americans. He also overlooked a few key measures of long-term joblessness-the true gauge of the demand for federal jobless benefits-which tell the entire story:
-- A record 77 percent of all workers collecting the federal extension now run out of their unemployment benefits, a rate which has increased steadily since the program was created in March 2002 and far surpasses the proportion of those who ran out of benefits during the last recession.
-- The number of long-term jobless peaked in September and October at over two million workers for the first time since the recession began. That represents an increase of over 700,000 workers compared to March 2002 when the federal extension program was created.
-- Congress did not vote to phase out the 1990s extension of unemployment benefits until the ranks of the long-term jobless (those unemployed longer than six months and still looking for work) began declining significantly.
-- The extended benefits program implemented during the last recession did not end until the economy had produced nearly three million jobs compared to its pre-recession levels. The current program is scheduled to end when there are 2.4 million fewer jobs than when the recession began.
"This callous move will not go unnoticed, especially for the millions of unemployed families struggling to makes ends meet," Emsellem said. "Hopefully, Congress and the President will spend the holiday brushing up on the facts and when they return for one final day in December they will pass a benefits programs that fits the reality of this prolonged jobless recovery."
For state-by-state data on the number of unemployed workers affected by the cutoff, please visit: http://releases.usnewswire.com/redir.asp?ReleaseID=23869&Link=http://www.unemployedworkers.org/docUploads/table4
To schedule an interview with an unemployed worker affected by the cutoff, please contact Jason Dring at 202-518-8047.
National Employment Law Project is a policy and legal advocacy organization concentrating on issues affecting low-wage and unemployed workers. NELP is based in New York City. For more information about NELP, visit its web site at http://www.nelp.org.
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