Shaheen wants bigger expansion to unemployment insurance

Sen. Jeanne Shaheen (D-N.H.) on Friday announced she would introduce a proposal that would divert some money from the Treasury's bank rescue program to states' unemployment insurance funds.

Her effort is in response to Congress' larger plan to expand the jobless benefits program -- a reform process, she indicated on Friday, that does not go far enough.

“Our unemployed workers are in crisis – their benefits are drying up and the job market continues to decline,” Shaheen said in a statement.  “It is our responsibility to our workers and to our economy to make sure that our nation’s unemployed can pay the mortgage and keep food on the table while they look for work."

The effort to enhance unemployment assistance began last month in the House, which overwhelmingly approved a bill that would offer 13 weeks of additional jobless benefits to Americans in states that have unemployment rates above 8.5 percent. House lawmakers said it was the best they could do without further adding to the deficit. But Senate lawmakers from the more than 20 states with unemployment rates below the threshold demanded something more expansive.

Although Senate lawmakers have since tweaked their effort -- offering about 4 more weeks of assistance to all Americans who ran out of benefits at the end of September -- Shaheen reiterated on Friday that the bill needed more work. Her amendment, which she plans to introduce next week, would provide 13 weeks of unemployment insurance to all jobless Americans, and 17 weeks to those in states in the most dire of circumstances.

“The economy seems to have turned around for big banks executives, but today’s record unemployment rate proves that it hasn’t yet turned around for millions of American workers who still can’t find a job,” Shaheen said.  “If we can bailout the big banks that got us into this financial mess, we should also offer sufficient help to the people hit hardest by this recession – our unemployed workers.”