Posted on 04/04/2010 6:10:27 PM PDT by Diana in Wisconsin
On March 26, the U.S. Senate left Washington, D.C. without extending federal unemployment benefits. While the Senators are safe in the comfort of their homes surrounded by family and friends, hundreds of thousands of Americans will spend Easter wondering how they will feed their families, pay their bills and keep their homes.
According to Indiana's Department of Workforce Development, on April 4th, federal unemployment monies expire. If your initial state benefits end in the period between April 4th and the next federal extension, you will stop receiving unemployment benefits.
If your are on one of the 4 federal tiers of benefits and it ends during this period, your benefits will stop. The estimate is that the Senate's failure to extend benefits will impact about 200,000 Americans.
How did this happen?
1. Pres. Obama and the U.S. Congress failed to make unemployment a priority issue. There is no political benefit to focusing needed attention on unemployment. Politicians do not talk about "unemployment." Instead, they talk about "jobs." Unemployment is the pink elephant in the middle of the room ignored by elected leaders. No politician wants to remind his or her constituents that 15 million Americans are unemployed and that over 50% of state benefit plans are bankrupt. It is time to remind them by going to http://www.senate.gov and letting your view be known.
2. Pres. Obama and Congressional democrats made passage of the health care bill a false emergency. The fact is that health care reform is one of the many issues facing Americans. However, the Pres. and Congress had four years to fashion and pass reform that was meaningful and supported by the people. The Senate's failure to extend benefits will hurt American families starting tomorrow. The health care bill was given priority over the view of a majority of Americans. CBS News, not exactly a bastion of conservatism, reported on Friday "the poll, conducted March 29 through April 1, found that so far the president's efforts to build up support for the bill appear to be ineffective. Fifty-three percent of Americans say they disapprove of the new reforms, including 39 percent who say they disapprove strongly. In the days before the bill passed the House, 37 percent said they approved and 48 percent disapproved."
3. Opposition to unemployment benefits is growing on claim that benefits stops Americans from looking for jobs. This claim distracts people from the reality that there is only one (1) job available for every (5) unemployed Americans. Accordingly, even if every open job was filled by a unemployed person, four (4) of those unemployed people would still be out of a job. To stop unemployment benefits due to the alleged misdeeds of a few, will pull the safety net from hundreds of thousands of Americans doing everything they can to find a job.
The real solution is for the unemployed is to join together and speak with one powerful voice loud enough to make politicians stand up and notice. It starts with every unemployed person writing, emailing and calling their political leaders until they get the job done.
No body likes a self-employed complainer - get back to your 80 hour week, pay your damn taxes, pay for your damn $15k/year health care, and don’t even think about setting aside savings - the unions want your 401k - you selfish workaholic you!
“Meaning the companies are simply taking applications and aren’t really hiring.”
That’s happening in The Real World, too. We had nearly 100 people apply for 12 part-time SEASONAL jobs. (April through June; three months!)
Desperate people still call every day asking if they made the cut, and my boss has been done hiring for over two weeks.
This is partially false. I was on another forum where the discussion also centered on the expiration of unemployment benefits. Several of the respondents to the forum stated they did not look for a job because the only ones available were flipping burgers at a fast food joint. And the unemployment paid them more, so why take a greasy job. I have to assume they were telling the truth. There is a certain percentage of any population who will take the easy way, regardless of long term effects.
I am hoping there is a silver lining in this cloud and that people begin to realize this president and Congress do not care about them. Perhaps it will motivate many more people to join us in saying ENOUGH IS ENOUGH
I’ve been out of work for over 18 months... The DBA jobs I’ve applied for on Monster, Dice and CareerBuilder have netted me nothing. They tell me I’ve over-qualified (well, not really for the job I was applying for but whatever), I’m under-qualified (yeah, it’s SQL Server but I’ve spent over 20 years on DB2, many of the concepts are the same) and my favorite was, you’re perfect for the job but it’s too far of a commute for you, 60 miles one way (yes, I know but I’m willing to do it).
This sucks.
Well said, Colonel. Well said.
Senator Tom Coburn made a deal with Harry Reid to “pay for” the
unemployment extension. Senator Coburn is pulling a Jim Bunning,
with some help from other Republican Senators.
However, Pelosi said no. The House left so...
Therefore, no unemployment extension.
Get ready for the Republicans are mean stories by the Lamestream media
— instead of
WHy can’t the Democrats pay for a simple couple week extension?
Why are they so reckless in their spending of taxpayer money?
It’s all just a house of cards.
I can assure you, that receiving unemployment benefits reduces the urge to go back to work.
Thats partly because there is a bad perception out there that such jobs will pollute your resume.
HR departments today don’t value someone who is willing to take just any job. If you have a strong work history with a good company, then get laid off. Then you take a job part-time at a fast food joint to make ends meet. Other comapnies will LOOK DOWN ON YOU. You would be better off not taking that job at all.
If you have ever dealt with HR departments...you know what Im talking about. The people that work in there are the most overpaid group of idiots you will ever come across.
The lucky fully employed idiot ‘compassionate conservatives’ are out on FR tonight. Wait for your jobs to travel to India!
Is that when they have someone they want to hire but are legally required to list it publicly first?
((CatQuilt))
Hang in there. We’ve all been in, and/or all will be in your shoes one day.
I came back from my tour with Operation Desert Storm to a husband that was divorcing me (he had ‘fallen in love’ with someone else while I was gone for two years; they were having a baby to boot!) and I had NO job and NO home to come home to.
I’ve lost jobs before because I would just ‘become bored’ with the job in a few months and then would leave, anyway...
Really? So, you’re just looking for a nameless, faceless, unmotivated DRONE to work for you? Someone that won’t bring additional benefits to your company or somehow might just end up with YOUR job? LOL! I guess they did me a favor, Eh?
You’ll find your way. Something will turn up for you. I made it through a really rough patch; you can, too! :)
Ah, the old misconception that the short term unemployment is the same as the long term unemployment. Two very different classes of people. And to answer your question about the job fair, yes, I have been to lots of them recently, to hire qualified candidates.
Age discriminatioon is just a myth, jobs being exported to India to China and Singapore are just myths spread out by those pesky Communists. It’s the Communists, I tell you. You pay (through the reduction of your salary) into the unemployment insurance fund for 30 years and you don’t deserve a penny of it, you lazy slob, say the employed wise men of FR.
I love my job. I can’t imagine not having it...so I can imagine what a living hell these days are for some people.
See my ‘hard luck’ story posted above. Been there. Done that. Hope to never have to do it again!
(Of course, my ‘job’ was ‘eliminated’ because America Won, so it was rather bittersweet.) ;)
I’ve been looking hard for 16 months. Loosing the house and can hardly feed my family.
“The argument that unemployment benefits is causing people to not look for a job is complete bullcrap.
Have any of you ever been to a job fair lately? Hundreds and hundreds are turning in applications. There just arnt enough jobs.
And a lot of those jobs on Monster are autoposts.”
Tell me about it!
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