Congress clears UI extension.

On July 22, the House voted 272-152 to pass a bill (HR 4213) extending federal expanded unemployment insurance (UI) programs through the end of November. The Senate approved the $34 billion measure on July 21, after failing on four previous occasions to get the sixty votes needed to advance the bill to a final vote.  Approximately 2.5 million Americans temporarily lost access to benefits in the seven weeks since authorization for the programs lapsed.

The legislation extends the Emergency Unemployment Compensation (EUC) program – which provides up to 53 weeks of extended UI benefits for qualifying individuals – through November 2010, and makes the benefits retroactive for individuals who lost coverage while the program was lapsed. The bill also extends 100 percent federal funding for the Extended Benefits program, which provides additional benefits for individuals in states with higher unemployment rates. The bill does not include an extension of the Federal Additional Compensation program, which provided an additional $25 per week in UI assistance; this program was included in earlier versions of the bill, but was dropped to reduce the overall cost.

National Skills Coalition strongly supported a long-term extension of UI benefits to ensure workers and their families have the financial assistance they need during periods of extended unemployment. We applaud Congress for completing work on this important issue, and we hope lawmakers will quickly move to advance other policies and programs that contribute to our nation’s economic recovery efforts.