The midterm hangover having finally worn off, the 111th Congress returns today to kick off the lame-duck session, its last hurrah before its successor takes over. And the 112th Congress will look radically different, with Republicans in control of the House and the Democratic majority in the Senate significantly reduced. More…
Over the past year, Democrats in Congress have fought three times to reauthorize federally extended unemployment benefits, which provide up to 99 weeks of unemployment insurance to millions of jobless workers. Each time, Republicans have put up resistance, arguing that Democrats need to pay for the benefits by cutting spending More…
Late Thursday afternoon, President Obama signed into law a bill granting workers out of a job for more than 26 weeks additional unemployment insurance payments, paid for by the federal government. The benefits had been in place since November 2009, but had lapsed for seven weeks — an unprecedented More…
The Senate passed an extension of unemployment benefits through November last night; now the House has just done the same. Next stop: President Obama’s desk.
For more on this, see Annie’s more thorough assessment here.
This afternoon, the Senate cleared a crucial hurdle to reauthorizing the federal extension of unemployment benefits, held up in the Senate for an unprecedented two months. The upper chamber voted down a filibuster of H.R. 4213, also known as the jobs bill or the extenders package — the vehicle More…
Today, Congress plans to vote on a federal extension of unemployment benefits, held up in the Senate for an unprecedented two months. The Senate will reconsider H.R. 4213, also known as the jobs bill or the extenders package, as the vehicle for a $34 billion extension of jobless benefits More…
Speaking in the Rose Garden, surrounded by three unemployed workers, this morning President Obama again castigated Republicans for blocking the federal extension of unemployment benefits. And he implied hypocrisy on Republicans’ part — the GOP cut taxes and increased spending, expanding the deficit Republicans now demand get slashed; and the More…
On Tuesday, the Senate plans to vote on a federal extension of unemployment benefits, blocked by Senate Republicans for an unprecedented two months. The swearing-in of Carte Goodwin, the temporary replacement for the late Sen. Robert Byrd (D-W.Va.), will give Democrats the crucial 60th vote to overcome a More…
Sen. Jay Rockefeller (D-W.Va.) has answered the question on the minds of all the people who have lost their unemployment benefits in recent weeks: Senate appointee Carte Goodwin (D-W.Va.) will vote in favor of the unemployment benefits extension bill that the Senate will take up shortly after he More…
It ain’t uplifting, but it’s arguably the most pressing issue facing the country right now, so after the jump, check out TWI’s Annie Lowrey and the omnipresent Reihan Salam discussing the unemployment crisis on bloggingheads.tv:
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