Congress Should Send the President Legislation to Extend Jobless Benefits

From the Coalition on Human Needs:

The unemployment rate rose to 5.5 percent in May, up from 5.0 percent just a month before. According to the Wall Street Journal, that's the largest one-month increase in the past 22 years. Over the past six months, private sector jobs have dropped by 411,000, according to the Economic Policy Institute.

It's time for the federal government to respond. There were 861,000 more unemployed people last month, bringing the total to 8.5 million. But it's worse than that: 1.6 million people have been out of work for 27 weeks or more, up from 1.1 million a year ago.

The National Employment Law Project tells us there are 200,000 more long-term unemployed now than when Congress last passed extended benefits (March 2002). These long-term jobless workers have exhausted their state unemployment insurance - and there are fewer jobs now than when they started looking. Both the House and Senate have voted to provide at least a 13-week extension of unemployment benefits, and to attach that badly needed help to the war funding bill now before Congress.

Other priorities that have gotten strong votes in the House and/or Senate include improved education benefits for veterans, and delaying harmful Bush Administration regulations that would cut Medicaid funds for case management, transportation, and medical services for children in foster care or with disabilities, or for other poor sick people seeking outpatient care in hospitals. (For more information, see the Human Needs Report.)

The President has threatened to veto all these - help for the jobless, for veterans, and for vulnerable people needing Medicaid services. Rumors have been flying all week that the House leadership might abandon its commitment to help workers desperate for jobs and young and old alike in need of Medicaid services, sending the President a stripped-down bill to fund the war and veterans' education benefits.

There is no question that the growing numbers of veterans deserve education help. Jobless, vulnerable, and sick people need help, too. Economists understand that extending jobless benefits is one of the most effective ways to boost the economy.

We hope that the House will not walk away from championing the jobless, sick, and disabled.

We hope they will agree with Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, who said his support for the supplemental spending bill is contingent on inclusion of the unemployment insurance extension.

We do not know if Congress will have enough votes to override a veto, and we agree with Representatives Rangel, Levin, and McDermott, who sent the President a letter today calling on him to sign such a bill. But if the House does not even send these provisions to the President, they will bear a heavy part of the responsibility for the failure to meet these increasingly urgent needs.

We expect - and need - more from our leaders. Next week, we hope to write that we have not been disappointed. Deborah Weinstein Executive Director Coalition on Human Needs