[Congressional Record Volume 156, Number 88 (Monday, June 14, 2010)]
[House]
[Pages H4403-H4404]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                    RESPONSE TO LONG-TERM UNEMPLOYED

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the 
gentleman from Washington (Mr. McDermott) is recognized for 5 minutes.
  Mr. McDERMOTT. Mr. Speaker, we have a huge problem in our country 
that we haven't come to terms with, long-term unemployment. The number 
of Americans who have been jobless for over 6 months has hit the 
highest level ever recorded. I recently read an article that 
highlighted one of the long-term unemployed Americans. Her name is 
Cindy Paoletti. For 23 years she worked in the corporate accounting 
division of J.P. Morgan Chase in upstate New York. In December 2007, 
Ms. Paoletti was let go in a wave of layoffs that eventually shuttered 
the entire Syracuse operations center. Her job went to India.
  She started collecting unemployment benefits and severance while 
searching for a job. In her own words, Cindy says, ``I apply for 
everything out there.'' Now that she's about to run out of benefits, 
she has started taking money out of her IRA. She doesn't have health 
insurance, and she faces the daily fear of losing her home. I hear 
similar stories from all over the country. Jobless Americans are 
desperately looking for work, but there just aren't enough jobs to go 
around yet.
  Last week, I conducted a hearing in my subcommittee to discuss long-
term unemployment problems. Here are a few of the facts highlighted at 
the hearing: nearly 50 percent of the unemployed haven't been able to 
find a job for more than 6 months, the highest number ever recorded, 
which goes back to 1948. More than 10 million jobs must be created to 
restore the labor market to its pre-recession level.
  This huge jobs hole, created by 8 years of gross economic 
mismanagement under the Bush administration, has left five unemployed 
workers competing for every available job. In responding to these 
record rates of long-term unemployment, our first priority must be to 
maintain the current emergency Federal unemployment programs that have 
lapsed 2 weeks ago. People have been waiting for 2 weeks.
  The House passed an extension on these programs a long time ago, but 
the Senate has yet to clear the legislation. If the Senate fails to 
continue Federal unemployment program, 5 million long-term unemployed 
Americans will lose their extended benefits before the end of this 
year, with 1.2 million of them losing their benefits by the end of this 
month, June. We need to face the fact that even with an extension of 
these Federal unemployment programs, more than 3 million people are 
projected to exhaust all benefits available before the end of the year.

[[Page H4404]]

                              {time}  2000

  We need to provide more help for these long-term displaced workers, 
which could range from additional extended unemployment benefits in 
high unemployment States, to federally funded jobs programs, to better 
training employment services.
  A few months of employment gains, as welcome as they have been 
recently, have not suddenly eliminated the problem of long-term 
unemployment. We simply cannot abandon millions of Americans who have 
worked hard, played by the rules, and now find themselves with no jobs, 
no savings, and no support. We cannot let a huge section of the middle 
class go with nothing but food stamps.
  At the end of the article, I mentioned earlier Cindy Paoletti said, 
``Out of all the people I know that got laid off the same time as me, I 
think only three have found jobs. The rest . . . have exhausted 
unemployment or they're getting close to the end of it. Someone's got 
to do something.''
  The Congress is faced with this. The Senate is dawdling. It is time, 
Mr. Speaker, that they act and we then move on to the next level while 
we deal with long-term unemployment in this country. We cannot close 
our eyes and believe it's going to go away. It will not go away. We 
have to help the process.

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