The GOP (@gop) and especially the GOP House of Representatives (@houseGOP) under the ‘leadership’ of Speaker John Boehner (@speakerboehner) have performed a remarkable feat of financial destruction to millions of unemployed and especially the long-term job seeker.
While the Senate has passed an extension of unemployment that would last until the end of May, the GOP House has decided to ignore the issue until a multitude of pet legislation is approved. They are tying the approval of the Keystone Pipeline, the gutting of environmental and safety regulations and more tax cuts for corporations and the wealthy to any unemployment extension legislation, basically assuring that the long-term unemployed will be left on their own, since the GOP wish list is so vast that any legislation would take many months to go through the approval process.
Currently 2.5 million long-term unemployed have exhausted their 26 weeks of insurance. Each week another 72,000 job seeking American families exhaust their 26 weeks of benefits. How the GOP can so casually ignore so many people who need assistance during the job search is stunning. GOP fights to the point of shutting down government to keep taxes historically low for the mega wealthy, but they are silent when it comes to helping millions of American families that are struggling in a weak job market. GOP priorities remain feed the ich and starve the poor and middle class.
GOP ignore the following damage they are causing for partisan talking points:
In a typical month last year, 2.3 million children lived with a parent who had been unemployed for 26 weeks or longer, according to an updated analysis from the Urban Institute. That represents a threefold increase over how many lived in such a situation in 2007.
Every state has seen a big increase in the percentage of children who are impacted by long-term unemployment over the last six years, but Georgia, Illinois, Rhode Island, and Washington, D.C. have the largest shares, with more than 4.5 percent of all children affected. DC is particularly bad, with nearly 7.5 percent of children living with a parent who has been out of work for such a long time.
http://thinkprogress.org/economy/2014/01/13/3156981/long-term-unemployment-children/
GOP not only casually ignores the damage done to children of the long-term unemployed, but they also are abandoning soldiers sent into harms way:
The unemployment rate among veterans who had joined the military after September 11, 2001, averaged 9.0 percent last year, down from 9.9 percent in 2012, the Labor Department said. That was about 1.6 percentage points above the rate for the civilian population.
Joblessness among this group is set to worsen as the war in Afghanistan winds down. Pentagon’s proposed budget calls for the U.S. Army to shrink to around 450,000 from a war-time high of 570,000.
http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/03/20/us-usa-economy-veterans-idUSBREA2J27120140320
And that includes 270,000 long-term unemployed veterans:
Almost 270,000 veterans would benefit from enacting this legislation into law. Veterans are losing this vital lifeline every day. It’s time for the House to act.
See how many unemployed veterans would benefit from the Senate-passed unemployment insurance compromise in your state:
See more at: http://www.dpcc.senate.gov/?p=blog&id=290#sthash.IcwahUPi.dpuf
Yet if a few mega profitable corporations or individuals demanded a tax shelter or favorable legislation, the GOP would be there in a heartbeat to offer their assistance. When it comes to assisting children and veterans? Not so much. All you can hear form the GOP House when it comes to helping children and veterans financially harmed by the damage of long-term unemployment is the sound of crickets.
The Twitter #RenewUI hashtag contains those who are fighting the GOP integrisense on extending unemployment insurance. Show your support for their efforts to extend a financial lifeline to milions of hard working Americans and their families.
Republican interest in helping the long-term unemployed.
This post will be updated as new information becomes available.
Tags: #renewUI, GOP, jobs, long term unemployed, unemployed, unemployment, unemployment benefits, veterans
