U.S. Winds Down Longer Benefits for the Unemployed

[alp227]

Source: NY Times

Hundreds of thousands of out-of-work Americans are receiving their final unemployment checks sooner than they expected, even though Congress renewed extended benefits until the end of the year.

The checks are stopping for the people who have the most difficulty finding work: the long-term unemployed. More than five million people have been out of work for longer than half a year. Federal benefit extensions, which supplemented state funds for payments up to 99 weeks, were intended to tide over the unemployed until the job market improved.

In February, when the program was set to expire, Congress renewed it, but also phased in a reduction of the number of weeks of extended aid and effectively made it more difficult for states to qualify for the maximum aid. Since then, the jobless in 23 states have lost up to five months’ worth of benefits.

Next month, an additional 70,000 people will lose benefits earlier than they presumed, bringing the number of people cut off prematurely this year to close to half a million, according to the National Employment Law Project. That estimate does not include people who simply exhausted the weeks of benefits they were entitled to.

Read more: http://www.nytimes.com/2012/05/29/business/economy/extended-federal-unemployment-benefits-begin-to-wind-down.html?pagewanted=all

[Politicalboi]

1. Well,

We have to pay for those tax breaks for the rich. After all, they know how to make money work, unlike us peons.

[newthinking]

2. Conveniently for politicians, this will make many "dissappear" from the unemployment figures

[coalition_unwilling]

6. Not true necessarily, as the unemployment figures are calculated from household surveys conducted

by the Bureau of Labor Standards and have little to do with the figures for those receiving unemployment insurance. Of course, if someone suddenly stops receiving unemployment, they may elect to go on disability (assuming they qualify) which would remove them from the labor force (and hence from the unemployment figures).

[newthinking]

10. Learn something new every day. I stand corrected

Pulled up the site and read the definition and as you stated UI is not part of the criteria.

I think where I got the impression they were linked is mistaking the stats on changes in unemployment rolls, which is sometimes used as an economic indicator. Thanks!

[JayhawkSD]

15. Well, yes and no

The survey has to do with "actively looking for work." UI benefits requires that you be actively looking for work, so there will be a significant number who, once benefits are cut off, will quit actively looking for work and will therefor no longer be counted as unemployed.

[coalition_unwilling]

18. Yeah, I suppose you have a point although I have

trouble understanding how people who lose their benefits can stop looking for work. How the fuck do they survive without work? In my case, it simply means I'll have to settle for some shitty job for some rich, unctuous pricks at about 50% of what I used to make (if that). But I'll still be actively looking for work. Losing my benefits won't cause me to stop looking for work.

[fasttense]

21. Yes, but that survey is very carefully distributed so as to NOT include high unemployment

regions such as Appalachia and the inner cities.

So, though those household surveys do include some long term unemployed, they do NOT represent an accurate picture of the employment situation in the US.

[may3rd]

28. ""Congress renewed extended benefits until the end of the year. ""

So what you are saying then, is a spike in disability recipients will be seen around 12/21/2012 ?
No matter how the spin, I can't see the system holding up under the borrowing that funds it

[coalition_unwilling]

34. There has actually already been an increase in the number of people applying

for disability, as they reach the end of the 99-week period of benefits.

My point is that if someone starts receiving disability, by definition they are no longer part of the work force and thus no longer potentially a part of the unemployment statistics.

[IamK]

3. another Obama failure....

[Dragonfli]

11. That was one of his good deals I am told, they got a few months UI, the rich a few years

of lower taxes, it is called shared sacrifice.

Eat your peas, they are delicious, and far better than the cake offered in times past!

[cstanleytech]

17. No, it wasnt a failure but nor was it a success imo because to get them to sign off on it

he traded them (the republicans) an extension on the Bush tax cuts for the wealthy and like many of us predicted giving the wealthy tax breaks without a stick to goad them into doing things like raising the pay for the average worker and or higher more people in the country as full time workers doesnt work just like it didnt work when Reagan tried it when he first got into office.

[SemperEadem]

19. it was more a congressional failure

they are the ones who write legislation.

[may3rd]

29. Few people blame "those that do so little for so many"

They also control the pork that does so much for so few

[markmyword]

4. Election Day is Coming

Let's hope these unemployed, who are now without any financial help from our government, are still allowed to vote.

Unless they're knocked off the voting rolls for being unemployed, they should vote these politicians out of office, who keep supporting the wealthy 1 % and that's any Democrat or Republican.

We'd have plenty of money to help the unemployed, if OUR money wasn't being used to fight illegal wars, started by the Bush/Cheney administration.

[alp227]

27. Shhhh...don't give the con artists any ideas!

If they do vote they will vote against ANY incumbents (including Democrats) out of frustration.

[nobodyspecial]

32. Are you suggesting the unemployed vote Obama out of office?

And, of course the unemployed can vote. Where did you see a suggestion that they were not going to be able to vote?

And, if you want to get rid of Dems, who do you suggest we replace them with?

[coalition_unwilling]

5. I'm one of the affected. California was de-certified for the FED-ED

extension (the 5th and final extension of 20 weeks) as of May 12, 2012. Lost out on some 17 weeks of benefits.

Now I'll have to take a job I hate working for some unctuous prick at a 25-50% pay cut or start tapping my IRA.

[may3rd]

30. How many weeks did you collect in all?

I know a guy that was on his final 99th week. He got a job doing what he did before. Now he pays into the insurance plan for those that are still drawing
Somebody up thread said you should switch to disability. You won't be on the unemployment numbers but still can draw $$.

Dunno if that is a good thing.

[coalition_unwilling]

33. As close as I can tell, I collected 82 weeks (so 3 weeks of the

final 20-week Fed-Ed extension). As for applying for disability, that smacks to me of 'fraud' so I'm not going to do it. (I'm not sure I even know how to do it, were I so inclined.) On a humorous note, all my disabilities are on the inside where they can't be seen

Props to your friend for landing a job. Under normal circumstances, employees do not pay into unemployment. Only employers pay into it (although employees probably receive lower wages b/c their employers have to pay into UI).

[Iliyah]

7. yea,

they who will take 27 thousand jobs away.

[jtuck004]

8. So 500,000 people times $450 (average benefit according to Cal State website)

$225,000,000 gone from the economy. The worst part is that those are people who spend most all of that, so this comes directly off demand, and may stop some housing payments (though if the mortgage is "underwater" they might be better off walking away anyway), putting a little more pressure on housing.

[ProfessionalLeftist]

9. Convenient way for Congressional Repigs to bomb the economy just

months before the election. What magnificent timing. Coincidence?

[Dragonfli]

12. They did not do this alone by "house edict"

Contrary to popular belief a Republican held house does not rule as a monarchy.

[ProfessionalLeftist]

13. They do hold the pursestrings though.

EDIT: Or I should say, Grover Norquist does.

[Dragonfli]

14. This was the result of a deal agreed to by the POTUS, are you saying he works for them?

Because I disagree, he made a deal, he felt very good about it at the time, and now we live with it, preferably without blaming Obama for being a pragmatic bi-partisan leader when these issues were dealt with.

You either agree with him or you don't.
He either sold us out or saved us.

I say he saved us, think how bad we would be without the shared sacrifice he explained to us we needed when he made this deal for US.

You are not being fair to Obama, this was one of his accomplishments.
You are attempting to take it off the list, that is simply not factual nor is it fair.

[Bette Noir]

16. It's a deal he made, but it was a lousy deal.

He traded a few months of this for a few years of that. He's a great orator, but not much at arithmetic.

[ProfessionalLeftist]

22. Lousy deal indeed. n/t

[ProfessionalLeftist]

23. I'm saying THEY hold the pursestrings

I don't see where I wrote anything else. But if you need to redefine what I wrote in order to be right, by all means, do carry on.

[AndyTiedye]

25. The Alternative was No Deal At All, Big Tax Hikes for Everyone, and NO Unemployment Extension AT ALL

Leading very quickly to a trashed economy and a Repiglickin sweep in this year's elections.

You can't get a good deal without some leverage. We haven't got any.

[Dragonfli]

31. The alternative was letting the Bush tax cuts expire, big tax hikes for the rich, small tax hikes

for the workers.

The revenue from not making the Bush tax cuts as permanent as possible would have rendered talks of cutting social programs moot (thank God we avoided that and made room for Simpson/Bowles.)

In the end we needed Unemployment extensions, we could have held tax cuts hostage instead of letting them hold workers hostage and brokering a deal that screwed the workers twice, but wisely we chose the third way blue dog approach of giving corporations whatever they want in exchange for far less.

That is pragmatism and that is why I support this president, he will always share the sacrifice, they will sacrifice their empathy and our working poor will sacrifice everything else.

Are you against Obama now? This is what he wanted and we all agree the Bush tax cuts are the most important thing to preserve as the bulk of that money helped keep us in debt, which helps the banks, which helps the rich with both tax breaks and debt owed to them. Thus incentivizing the job creators

Only by agreeing to allow most of the money to flow from the shared sacrifice towards the top could we help the job creators,
They are what we need to bolster.

Workers are cheap and we are making three more free trade deals to get even more cheap labor. You do not understand the necessity of Friedman economics like Obama does, you need to stop criticizing him and help him triangulate so that the job creators can work their miracles and we can broaden our tax base by making the so called poor pay more in taxes. We can be competitive with Korean labor, that is what paleo Dems refuse to admit, it is possible to squeeze more work for less cash than we already are!

You need a serious lesson in serious third way bipartisanship as well as free trade and Friedman/Chicago economics.
That is the course we are following and it is a winning one.

Thank you for your concern and I hope your stay at a Democratic site is a good one.

[AndyTiedye]

26. They Have the House, the Supreme Court, and the Media

When the "blue dogs" vote with them, they control the Senate too.

[chervilant]

20. Texas Workforce Commission

has found a clever way to save their precious resources: they've decided I received an 'overpayment' of $1,380! Never mind that I have no job, no income of any kind, and no PRAYER of giving them money!

I thought it was supposed to be the other way 'round...

[love0bama-4ever]

24. I was blessed with a job on very last week of my unemployment

On the very last week of my last unemployment check, I was called from a fairly good
job in an office,funny thing is that they called me the day after the interview, which normally, that is not the usual thing, you have to wait maybe week or two or three before they decide. I truly was LUCKY, i tell you, and I give thanks every single day when I wake up every day.