4 Million Americans Set To Lose Unemployment Benefits Even If Congress Passes Extension (CHART)

[Joanne98]

Even as Congress debates whether to extend emergency unemployment checks for more than six million Americans who are approaching the 99-week limit, some four million others are facing the certain end of their benefits over the next year, unless an entirely new program is crafted.

This is the sobering conclusion of a report released by the President's Council of Economic Advisers on Thursday. The study forecast that the exhaustion of unemployment benefits for so many will curb spending power enough to significantly impede an already weak economic recovery.

The typical household now receiving emergency unemployment benefits would see their income fall by a third should they lose their checks, according to the report. Among the roughly 40 percent of households in which the person receiving a check is the sole breadwinner, income would fall by 90 percent.

The existing emergency unemployment program, which extends benefits for nearly two years, expired on Wednesday. Without an agreement to extend the program, the economy will lose about 600,000 jobs, as the spending enabled by continued unemployment checks ceases. National economic output--which expanded at an annual pace of 2.5 percent during the summer months--would fall off by 0.6 percent.

That disturbing prospect does not even account for the roughly four million people who would exceed even the extended limits in the emergency program. Were that many jobless people left to fend themselves without unemployment checks, that would pose significant risks for the broader economy, say economists. They cite the fact that consumer spending accounts for roughly 70 percent of all economic activity.

"If you're looking for economic recovery supported by consumers, it's discouraging," said Henry J. Aaron, an economist at the Brookings Institution, a research institution in Washington. "It's drag on the economy."

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/12/03/unemployment-benefits-99ers-obama_n_791682.html

[MannyGoldstein]

1. So what's your point?

Most of the cash goes to the wealthiest Americans, so this is a success.

Perhaps the unemployed can sell their children, or a kidney, or do something else entrepreneurial.

[fasttense]

2. Seems our discouraged worker pool keeps getting larger and larger.

and they don't even get counted in that fake 9.8% unemployment rate the media and Obama claims represents the job market.

I love the way the gubermint lumps discouraged workers, people who have been out of work so long they can no longer qualify for a job if they can find one, with those people who work part time. Makes it seems like there is always a part time job for us losers who can't find full employment. As if the part timers and the 99ers are the same people.

[Doctor_J]

3. Damn. I hadn't even finished my first bottle of champaign from yesterday's

"success". I think I'll switch to hemlock.

[reggie the dog]

4. 90% loss of income

means that i would buy a gun... and a ski mask... or buy a kilo of grass, heroin or crack and go into business, i would not watch my wife prostitute herself to feed me and the kids. dealing first, robbing second??? naaa drugs are worse than robbing to most judges, may as well just rob, but sorry, cant leave any witness even if i have a ski mask...bang your fucking dead and its like that! look for violence to explode across the country along with theft, drug dealing and the violence between new and old dealers, as well as more prostitution and violence between the old and new hookers....

[Skittles]

5. THE OBSCENELY RICH ARE MORE IMPORTANT!!

GET WITH THE PROGRAM, JOANNE!