[Congressional Record Volume 148, Number 12 (Tuesday, February 12, 2002)]
[House]
[Page H233]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                    UNEMPLOYMENT BENEFITS EXTENSION

  Mr. BROWN of Ohio. Mr. Speaker, in the first 6 months of 2002, 2 
million American workers are expected to exhaust their unemployment 
benefits. Even when we account for growth in the workforce, this means 
more workers are expected to exhaust their benefits in the next 3 
months than in any first quarter since the early 1970s.
  Of those exhausting benefits over the next 6 months, only 4 percent, 
4 percent, are expected to receive extensions through State 
unemployment programs.
  This extraordinary number of anticipated exhaustions is due to the 
huge number of job losses that occurred in the last 6 months of 2001. 
These job losses were caused by a slowing economy, by unsound trade 
policies and by the devastating attacks of September 11. To make 
matters worse, many of the jobs lost in 2001 were good-paying, high-
skilled manufacturing jobs that have probably been lost forever.
  In my home State of Ohio and across the country, the steel industry 
has been devastated by a combination of foreign dumping and the current 
recession. According to the Department of Labor, the U.S. has lost 1.4 
million manufacturing jobs since President Bush took office, 1.4 
million manufacturing jobs. Total job losses from 2001 reduced our 
manufacturing base by 8 percent, 8 percent in 1 year, diminishing our 
industrial capacity to 1964 levels.
  In each of the last five recessions, the Federal Government stepped 
in to provide additional benefits to those temporarily out of work. 
This recession, Mr. Speaker, should be no different.
  Last week efforts to craft a bipartisan stimulus package failed in 
the Senate. The Senate did, however, approve a 13-week extension of 
unemployment benefits.
  For the last 5 months, however, the Republican leadership in this 
House has repeatedly promised to help laid-off workers. They made that 
promise during the debate of the initial disaster relief bill; then 
they did nothing. They made that promise during the debate of the $5 
billion airline bailout bill; then they did nothing. They made that 
promise in the two economic stimulus bills passed by the House; again, 
Republican leadership did nothing.
  The question is, were their promises to help laid-off workers, to 
help America's unemployed, were their promises contingent upon simply 
obtaining new and permanent tax breaks for America's wealthiest 
companies and wealthiest individuals? To prove this is not the case, I 
urge the Republican leadership to bring a simple, clean 13-week 
unemployment benefit extension to the House floor as soon as possible. 
Our workers have waited long enough.

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