[Congressional Record Volume 147, Number 158 (Thursday, November 15, 2001)]
[House]
[Pages H8232-H8233]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                    EXTENDING UNEMPLOYMENT BENEFITS

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the 
gentleman from California (Mr. George Miller) is recognized for 5 
minutes.
  Mr. GEORGE MILLER of California. Mr. Speaker, yesterday the Committee 
on Education and the Workforce held a hearing at the request of the 
Democratic Caucus to listen to those individuals who have been impacted 
by the downturn in the economy, workers, Mr. John Sweeney, the 
president of the AFL/CIO, who represents many, many workers who have 
been caught in this downturn in the economy.
  As we listened to two of the witnesses, Mr. Michael Hannah, who is a 
member of the Steel Workers in Birmingham, Alabama, who has worked for 
29 years in that industry and recently, working for Butler 
Manufacturing, has just been told that he will be laid off indefinitely 
as of November 30. Mr. Hannah had been laid off earlier this year for 4 
months. And, of course, what Mr. Hannah is now confronting is, his 
unemployment benefits of $190 a week are running out.
  We also heard from Linda Woods. Linda Woods has been employed in the 
commercial printing and advertising industry for the last 18 years and 
for one company the last 8 years, making $19.11 an hour, but she too 
has been laid off and she is down to her last unemployment check. Her 
son, who is also working and helping her obviously while he is holding 
down two jobs for a hotel and an auto parts factory, has lost both of 
those jobs. First went the hotel job and then the auto parts factory 
job. So that income has been lost to her household.
  Mr. Hannah told us also of the problems of his wife who just suffered 
a back injury and is unable to work and needs a lot of expensive 
medicines, as he said. He has also told us he would not be able to 
continue his health insurance under the COBRA program which allows 
unemployed people to continue to have their health insurance they had 
when they were working, but they must pay for, would cost him $529 a 
month. And, of course, his unemployment provides him $760 a month, and 
he is unable to pay for that. So it is not a luxury, but it is 
something he must let go if he is going to try to meet his mortgage 
payment and the rest of the obligations to his family.
  Ms. Woods was in the same situation. On her unemployment, she would 
have had to pay $200 a month for her COBRA and she can not afford to do 
that, nor can her son.
  These are two individuals that, between them, have worked almost 50 
years, 50 years; and now they find themselves having to need 
unemployment for 26 weeks and that has run out. And yet this Congress 
has failed to respond to provide for an extension of unemployment 
benefits. We provided a bailout for the airline industry for $15 
billion, $5 billion in cash. We provided $38 billion to the energy 
industries in tax provisions. We have provided a repeal of the 
alternative minimum tax so that some of the richest and largest 
corporations in the world would get their taxes forgiven back to 1986. 
We have provided tax reductions for the wealthiest people in this 
country. And most recently now the President has suggested we speed up 
those tax reductions to that same group of very, very wealthy 
individuals.
  But what the Congress has not found time to do is to take care of the 
hundreds of thousands of people, the millions of people in this country 
that are in the same situation as Linda Woods and Michael Hannah. What 
we have not found time to do is extend the unemployment benefits for 
another 26 weeks or another 13 weeks or whatever we can do to help 
these people. Many of these people were unemployed before September 11. 
But because of the September 11 terrorist attack in New York City and 
the Pentagon, the economy has gotten worse.
  So their situation in trying to find work has become more difficult, 
and many people who are unemployed because of September 11 in the hotel 
industry, the travel industry, they now find themselves trying to 
replace their income in a worsening job market. If they look for work 
for 30 hours a week, they cannot get unemployment because that is not 
full-time, and while 97 percent of the businesses in this country pay 
into unemployment insurance, less than 40 percent of the people are 
covered.
  Mr. Speaker, I realize my time is running out. I just want to say 
this. As Congress heads home for Thanksgiving dinner with their family, 
the holidays with their children and grandchildren, we had better 
remember these families and pass the unemployment extension bill so 
that they can do it. It is the most efficient economic stimulus we can 
provide. These people will spend the money to create the demand so the 
economy can recover. We ought to do it and we ought to do it now.

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