Emergency Unemployment Compensation Extension Act -- Motion To Proceed -- Continued

Floor Speech

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Mr. President, I rise today in support of the Emergency Unemployment Compensation Extension Act. That would be S. 1845. This is legislation that will continue to be a critical safety net for workers who have fallen on tough times through no fault of their own. Just a few short hours ago, as you know, the Senate sent a strong message by voting to move forward on this vital legislation to restore unemployment insurance for the more than 1 million Americans whose benefits expired on December 28.

I wish to thank Senator Jack Reed and Senator Heller for their bipartisan leadership on this issue. This is a very important step in providing economic security for the millions of Americans who lost their unemployment benefits at the end of the year or who will lose them this year if Congress does not act.

By helping people to stay on their feet after an unexpected job loss, unemployment insurance has kept millions of Americans out of poverty. Rather than removing the safety net these people rely on, we should be focused on policies that help the long-term unemployed get back to work, including the help that will allow them to pay their rent and fill their gas tanks while they are searching for jobs.

Yesterday I released the Joint Economic Committee report making the economic case for extending the Federal support for our unemployment insurance, designed to keep long-term unemployed Americans above water as they search for work. Approximately 1.3 million workers, as we know, lost their unemployment benefits on December 28. Barring Congressional action, benefits will expire for an additional 3.6 million over the next year. In my home State of Minnesota, roughly 8,500 people lost benefits at the end of last year and about 65,000 Minnesotans will lose benefits by the end of December of 2014.

These are people who may have had a plant close in their town. Maybe their position was eliminated and no one is hiring. Either way, these are people who have been paying into the system for their working lives and we need to see them through to their next job.

This is especially important at a time of stubbornly high long-term unemployment. For most Americans, State-funded unemployment insurance lasts 26 weeks. Yet the average unemployment spell lasts 10 weeks longer. In 2008, as our country went into the worst downturn since the Great Depression, Congress authorized Federal support for extended unemployment benefits for those who were out of work for more than 26 weeks. For people struggling to find work during those dark days, the extension was a lifeline. For the millions of Americans still searching for work as our economy recovers, it is a critical safety net.

Our economy, as we know, has come a long way since the downturn began, with the national unemployment rate now lower than it has been in 5 years. In my home State of Minnesota we are doing even better. The unemployment rate is more than two points below the national average. We are proud of that for our businesses. We are proud of that for our workers.

But there is a problem that remains. While the overall workforce is growing stronger every day, we are still facing significant challenges with long-term unemployment. At 2.6 percent, that is people long-term unemployed more than 6 months, it is more than twice what it was when Congress last allowed Federal unemployment insurance to expire after the recessions of 1990-1991 and 2001. In fact, in our report we have a graph that shows that literally this unemployment rate we are facing now for the long-term unemployed is twice what it has been in any other year when we faced a decision in Congress and decided in fact to terminate those benefits.

Literally, that long-term unemployment rate is now twice what it was in those other years. That is why there is so much concern about stopping the benefits at this point.

In Minnesota, our long-term unemployment rate is 1.4 percent, much better than it is in many States in the country, but too many Minnesota communities are still hurting, with unemployment rates reaching as high as 9.5 percent in Clearwater County in Minnesota.

Given the numbers, Federal support for unemployment insurance is more important than ever for the long-term unemployed. Extending this critical safety net is fair. American families, struggling against long-term unemployment, are working hard to find a job, to put food on the table, to pay their bills. They are not exactly the ones who have seen the upturn from the stock market that many people have seen in the last years. They are not the ones who have seen their stocks rise. They don't have stocks. They are just trying to put food on the table for their families. They are not faceless, nameless charity cases. They are our neighbors, they are our family members, and they are our friends. In fact, nearly one out of every five Americans has either received or is living with someone who has received Federal unemployment benefits since 2008. That is 69 million people. Almost 24 million long-term unemployed workers have directly benefited and another 45 million Americans, including nearly 17 million children, are living with someone who is receiving unemployment insurance.

These benefits help carry families through long unemployment spells, pay the mortgage, rent, utilities. While the average unemployment insurance benefit of $300 per week only replaces about one-third of an individual's average weekly wage, unemployment insurance benefits have kept 11 million Americans out of poverty; 2.5 million in 2012 alone. That is 2.5 million Americans kept out of poverty because of this program.

In 13 States, over 40 percent of those who are unemployed have been out of work for more than 26 weeks and have exhausted their State-funded benefits. Nationally nearly 38 percent of unemployed workers are long-term unemployed. These are the workers, the 4.9 million Americans who will lose their unemployment insurance if we fail to pass this bill. These benefits help them to keep looking for work, support their children and families, and contribute to the economy.

The longer a person is unemployed, the more difficult it is for that person to find a job. Skills atrophy and professional networks dry up. But you can't go on a job interview if you cannot even fill up your car with gas, so we also need to make sure the long-term unemployed are not left high and dry after State-funded unemployment benefits run out.

Addressing long-term unemployment is a problem that calls for an all-of-the-above solution. We need to do more to support American workers.

This is the right thing to do. We also know it is better for the economy. The CBO has found that each dollar of unemployment insurance increases the GDP by as much as $1.90, and extending the Federal unemployment benefits through 2014 would boost GDP by a .2 percentage point and increase employment by 200,000 jobs. Failing to extend Federal unemployment benefits will cost the economy 240,000 jobs, according to the Council of Economic Advisors. Those are the numbers with which we are dealing.

We also know if we look at the suggestions of the debt commission--something that I think is a very important body of work and has some very good ideas in it--their idea is trying to get about $4 trillion in debt reduction. We are something above $2.6 trillion of the way there with more to do, but the point is there are ways to get there. One of my favorite ways is to pass the immigration bill. CBO has found that in the second 10 years that will actually save $700 billion on the debt by making people pay taxes, by bringing them out of the shadows so they pay fines. That is what we are dealing with.

If we want to look at ways to reduce our debt, I don't think we should be doing it on the backs of the most vulnerable, those kids, those people who are long-term unemployed who still have not been able to find a job. In many States it is still a very difficult economy. Especially for the long-term unemployed, this is the right thing to do. We shouldn't leave these Americans in the lurch. We need to restore this critical safety net and focus on getting Americans back to work.

I urge my colleagues to support the bill.

I yield the floor.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.

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