Hundreds of thousands are maxing out unemployment benefits

As state employment benefits run out, the federal Pandemic Emergency Unemployment Compensation (PEUC) program has helped COVID-idled American workers get by, but funding for it is expiring. Funding for another program aiding the self-employed, Pandemic Unemployment Assistance (PUA), expires at the end of December. Congressional action is required to extend the income assistance, and that’s not happening.

More:

“Hundreds of thousands of Americans are about to max out their state unemployment benefits,” Kathryn Krawczyk, The Week

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Congress Gives the Jobless a Christmas Gift

“More than 1 million Americans are bracing for a harrowing, post-Christmas jolt as extended federal unemployment benefits come to a sudden halt this weekend, with potentially significant implications for the recovering U.S. economy. A tense political battle likely looms when Congress reconvenes in the new, midterm election year.”

— “1.3 Million Losing Unemployment Benefits Saturday,” Bradley Klapper, Associated Press

(un)Employment Report

In a regular monthly exercise in statistical flim-flam, the Bureau of Labor Statistics has released the jobless numbers for November 2011.

The meaningless unemployment rate in the headlines: 8.6%, down a whopping 0.4% from last month. The real unemployment rate: 15.6% (includes people who no longer get unemployment benefits, need work but have stopped looking because it’s futile, or have only found part-time work). Some even put that real rate at 18.8. Learn more here.

Millionaire Hostage-Takers

Republicans in Congress are holding middle class American families hostage at the bidding of their wealthy masters. GOP Congressmen refuse to continue Bush-era tax breaks for middle-income households unless millionaires get tax breaks, too. Astoundingly, they persist in arguing that tax breaks for the rich produces “trickle-down” benefits for the rest of us, the same nonsense they used to lead the country into financial ruin in the first place.