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Home > News

Rep. McDermott Announces House Vote Scheduled for UI Extension

September 18, 2009

Rep. Jim McDermott (D-WA) announced late today that his legislation to extend unemployment benefits for 13 weeks in states where the unemployment rate is 8.5% on a rolling three-month average has been scheduled for a vote early Tuesday afternoon, September 22, in the House of Representatives.  The Majority Leader placed the bill, H.R. 3548, on the Suspension Calendar, which typically includes non-controversial bills and requires two-thirds voting in the affirmative for passage.  McDermott is chairman of the Income Security and Family Support Subcommittee, which has jurisdiction over the nation’s unemployment insurance system.

“I welcome and appreciate the decision by Majority Leader Steny Hoyer to place the UI extension bill on the Suspension Calendar,” Rep. McDermott said. “This underscores the urgency House Democratic leaders have placed on passing legislation that will continue to help hundreds of thousands of Americans who lost their jobs through no fault of their own in this so-called Great Recession.”

Earlier this summer, Rep. McDermott had introduced comprehensive UI legislation that included a 13-week extension of benefits. As Americans across the country heard about the bill, many called Rep. McDermott’s office to express thanks and ask when it might be voted on because their benefits were running out.  Two weeks ago, the congressman announced he was re-filing the extension as a separate bill in order to respond to the urgent needs of Americans who were about to run out of benefits at a time where there are six workers for every available job.
A copy of the legislation is attached. 

What follows is a high-point summary of the provisions:

Unemployment Compensation Extension Act of 2009
Introduced by Representative Jim McDermott

The legislation would extend unemployment benefits by up to 13 weeks for over 300,000 jobless workers who reside in high unemployment States (8.5% unemployment) and who are projected to run out of unemployment compensation by the end of September (and for over one million workers otherwise exhausting benefits before the end of the year).

These benefits will help workers who have lost their jobs through no fault of their own buy necessities for their families (increasing consumer demand), as well as continue their mortgage payments (reducing foreclosures).

Several indicators show the economy is slowly improving, but there are still nearly six unemployed Americans for every available job and long-term unemployment is at an historically high level - one-third of the unemployed, (5 million Americans) have been without work for longer than six months. 

This legislation would NOT add to the deficit because its cost would be completely offset by two provisions.  First, it extends for one year a federal unemployment tax (FUTA surtax) that has been in place for over 30 years and which President Bush proposed extending in his last budget (the tax costs employers $14 per year, per employee).  And second, it requires that current reporting on newly hired employees include the date work started to reduce UI overpayments (as proposed by both Bush and Obama budgets).

Over three-quarters of the workers projected to exhaust their unemployment benefits by September live in high unemployment States that would now qualify for an additional 13 weeks of benefits under the bill.  These high unemployment States are: AL, AZ, CA, DC, FL, GA, ID, IL, IN, KY, MA, ME, MI, MS, MO, NV, NJ, NC, NY, OH, OR, PA, PR, RI, SC, TN, WA, WI & WV.

Additional unemployed workers outside of these high-unemployment States also may qualify for more weeks of benefits this year because: (1) their State is close to meeting the 8.5% total unemployment rate (TUR) threshold in the bill (i.e., Alaska 8.2%) and another month of data might push the State’s rate to the required level; (2) their State is close to meeting the 8% TUR required under the permanent-law Extended Benefits (EB) program for 7 weeks of additional benefits (i.e., Connecticut at 7.9%, Colorado at 7.6% and Texas at 7.8%); (3) their State adopts the trigger to draw down 100% federally-funded EB benefits (i.e., Maryland, Mississippi, Louisiana and Hawaii are now eligible for an additional 13-20 weeks of EB if the States adopt the necessary trigger, a step already taken by 37 States); or (4) their State newly meets the 6% TUR requirement for additional benefits under the Emergency Unemployment Compensation (EUC) program.