Jobless aid clears GOP filibuster

60-40 vote sets refill of benefits up for passage

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., is joined Tuesday after the vote by freshly sworn-in Sen. Carte Goodwin, D-W.Va., who replaced the late Robert Byrd.
Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., is joined Tuesday after the vote by freshly sworn-in Sen. Carte Goodwin, D-W.Va., who replaced the late Robert Byrd.

— The U.S. Senate broke a Republican filibuster Tuesday and moved toward a final vote on legislation restoring unemployment benefits to 2.5 million Americans.

Senators voted 60-40 to move ahead on the bill, clearing the way for a final Senate vote today. The measure would restore jobless checks for people whose benefits started running out seven weeks ago in a stubbornly jobless economic recovery.

The vote was a modest victory for President Barack Obama and Democrats, whose more ambitious hopes for a jobs agenda have mostly fizzled in the face of Republican opposition in the Senate. A battle has been waged for months over whether jobless benefits should be financed with additional federal debt as Democrats want or through cuts to other government programs as most Republicans insist.

The vote to end debate on the measure came moments after Carte Goodwin was sworn in as a successor to West Virginia Democrat Robert Byrd, who died last month at the age of 92. Goodwin, a Democrat, was the crucial 60th senator to defeat a Republican filibuster that has led to a lapse in benefits. The Senate gallery was packed with Goodwin supporters, who broke into applause as he cast his “aye” vote.

Two Republicans, Olympia Snowe and Susan Collins of Maine, voted to end the filibuster. Ben Nelson of Nebraska was the lone Democrat to break with his party and vote to sustain it.

After a final Senate vote, the House is expected to approve the legislation and send it to President Barack Obama.

The measure would be the eighth extension of unemployment benefits since July 2008, at a total cost to taxpayers of more than $120 billion. The economy added 882,000 jobs so far this year - but many of those were only temporary positions as the federal government geared up to conduct the U.S. census.

Economists said it will take at least until the middle of this decade to recoup job losses due to the recession and drive down the nation’s unemployment rate, now at 9.5 percent, to a more normal 5.5 percent or 6 percent.

About 2.5 million people would receive jobless benefits retroactively, injecting almost $3 billion into the economy once they’re paid out. Millions of others will continue to receive payments that would help prop up consumer demand to the tune of about $30 billion more over the coming year.

“There are millions of Americans who are desperate to find work, and to once again be able to pay bills and provide for their families,” said a statement from the office of Sen. Mark Pryor, D.-Ark. “Those who are out of work would rather earn a paycheck than receive an unemployment check, but the demand for jobs simply outweighs the supply. This extension of benefits covers the bare necessities and allows an individual to continue an earnest job search.”

A statement from Katie Laning, campaign director for Arkansas’ Sen. Blanche Lincoln, said Lincoln “believes we can’t turn our backs on workers who have lost a job through no fault of their own and continue to seek employment.”

Republican Senate nominee John Boozman, who is challenging Lincoln for her seat, said that if unemployment benefits are extended, government needs to find a way to pay for them “that doesn't put us into more debt than we are already in. ... Folks need these unemployment benefits, and we should find a way to pay for them that is responsible.”

The U.S. Department of Labor estimates that 15,600 unemployed Arkansans have lost unemployment benefit insurance since the extensions expired on June 2, about 2,600 people a week, said Kimberly Friedman, spokesman for the Arkansas Department of Workforce Services.

Those who haven’t been getting the insurance during the past six weeks will be able to recoup that money, she said.

“Assuming the claimants continue to meet eligibility requirements and that Congress extends the program without making any changes, then the vast majority of the claimants who lost benefits because of the expiration of the program would begin receiving benefits again,” Friedman said.

In the week ended July 9, 20,032 people were receiving federal unemployment insurance, and 20,782 Arkansans were getting regular benefits from the state.

Republicans say that while they support the benefits extension, it should be paid for with cuts elsewhere in the $3.7 trillion federal budget.

“We’ve repeatedly voted for similar bills in the past. And we are ready to support one now,” said Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky. “What we do not support - and we make no apologies for - is borrowing tens of billions of dollars to pass this bill at a time when the national debt is spinning completely out of control.”

Democrats tout the economy-boosting effect of unemployment checks, since most beneficiaries spend them immediately. But the numbers amount to less than one-quarter of 1 percent of the size of the $14.6 trillion economy and are far smaller than last year’s $862 billion stimulus legislation. Republicans have blocked Democratic add-ons, such as aid to state governments, that could have meant a greater economic boost.

“It’s too small to have any noticeable impact on the economy’s growth rate,” said Joel Naroff, president of Naroff Economic Advisors. “But the benefits do provide an important safety net for people during these difficult economic times.”

The measure before the Senate would extend benefits averaging $309 a week through the end of November. Maximum benefits in some states are far higher; in Massachusetts, the top benefit is $943 a week. In Mississippi, the top benefit is just $235.

The White House has signaled that the administration may seek another renewal of benefits in November if unemployment remains high. After initially feeling heat this winter when a lone Republican senator, Jim Bunning of Kentucky, briefly blocked a benefits extension in February, the Republican Party has grown increasingly comfortable opposing such legislation.

Information for this article was contributed by Andrew Taylor and Jeannine Aversa of The Associated Press, Brian Faler of Bloomberg News, and Paul P. Quinn of the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette.

Front Section, Pages 1 on 07/21/2010

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