American Jobs And Closing Tax Loopholes Act Of 2010
Floor Speech
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Mr. HARKIN. Madam President, after months of obstruction, we have overcome a shameful effort by the Republican minority to block the extension of emergency unemployment benefits.
Because of the obstructionism of those on the other side of the aisle, more than 2 and a half million unemployed Americans have seen their benefits terminated in recent weeks--49 days ago, to be exact. They are among the nearly 6.8 million Americans who have been out of work for more than half a year. That is the highest number of long-term unemployed we have had since we started keeping track in 1948. Again, this is the highest number of long-term unemployment we have had since 1948.
In recent weeks, I have come to the Senate floor several times to share the heartbreaking letters and e-mails I have received from long-term unemployed workers in Iowa. These families are struggling to survive. These Iowans are trying their hardest, doing everything they can to find any kind of work. But the jobs just aren't there.
Officially, there are five job seekers for every new job opening. Unofficially, and more accurately, there are more than eight job seekers for every opening. Here on the chart, it says that when you include the discouraged workers who aren't counted in the official numbers, unemployment has gone up to 26 million. Yet there are 3.2 million job openings. So there is between five and eight unemployed workers for every job opening.
I say to those desperate families in Iowa and across America that we have listened to you, we have heard you, and we have been fighting desperately over the last 49 days here to get an extension of unemployment insurance benefits. Every time we have tried it, we have been obstructed by the minority, the Republicans. So thanks, today, to the first vote cast by the new Senator from West Virginia, Mr. Carte Goodwin--by the way, I might say to Senator Goodwin, who was just sworn in at about 2 p.m. and then cast his first vote, he can be rightfully proud of the first vote he cast in the Senate--to help lift up people who, in many cases, have lost all hope, to make sure families get the necessary wherewithal to put food on the table and keep their families together. Thanks to the first vote of the new Senator from West Virginia, today we were able to get cloture and stop the filibuster.
I also thank the two Republicans--Senator Snowe and Senator Collins--who also voted with us today to make sure we were able to get this extension into law.
Just remember, on three occasions this summer Republican Senators pulled out the stops to filibuster and kill efforts to extend unemployment benefits. During that time, we heard a rising chorus on talk radio and even from some Senators. They said that extending unemployment benefits would be a bad idea because, in so many words, people are lazy, and they are just relying on their benefits instead of looking for work.
As the distinguished minority whip, the Senator from Arizona, Mr. Kyl, put it:
......continuing to pay people unemployment compensation is a disincentive for them to seek new work.
I believe that is woefully out of touch with the reality of trying to survive on unemployment benefits. Let's look at the facts. While the numbers vary from State to State, the average weekly unemployment benefit nationwide is only about $300 a week. As this chart shows, $300 a week in UI benefits adds up to about $15,000 a year. That is the average. The poverty line for a family of four is $22,000 a year. So is the Senator from Arizona saying someone who is getting $15,000 a year--a family of four--would rather get that than find a job and make well over $22,000 a year, which would be the poverty line? Would they rather exist on $15,000 a year than, say, $45,000 a year or $55,000 or $60,000 a year?
It is incredible to think that someone would say that when there is one job for five to eight people out there looking. To say that somehow by giving them $15,000 a year--$300 a week--that will keep them from going to work is preposterous.
This line of argument is not just absurd and factually wrong, it is shameful. It is shameful to say that about hard-working Americans, who, through no fault of their own, are out of a job. I keep saying every time I come to the Senate floor that we all have jobs here. Every time I come here and look around, I see fellow Senators and staff--we all have jobs. We are not worried about tomorrow. Think about your own family. What if you were out of work and have been out of work for a year and you are out there looking for work, and for every job there are eight other people out there looking for that job? You have to put yourself in the shoes of those kinds of families.
It is shameful to say somehow that by giving people unemployment benefits, they are not going to go back to work because of that--I have more faith in the American people. The American people want to work. In fact, the figures show that we are still the most productive Nation on Earth. Does that somehow point to lazy Americans? No. Given the opportunity, Americans can outwork anybody anywhere in the world--if there is only a job.
To say that somehow giving unemployment benefits encourages people to be lazy flies in the face of the facts about hard-working Americans--how hard they work and how productive American workers are. Well, there is little question that the long-term unemployed would like nothing more than to pull themselves up by the bootstraps. But this economy right now is very short on bootstraps.
Our Republican colleagues have trotted out another justification for stopping extending unemployment benefits. They say that extending the benefits will add to the deficit. They argue that we should cut off some of the most desperate people in our economy. We should take away their last meager lifeline out of a concern for the deficit.
Yet these very same Senators today are demanding that the 2001 and 2003 tax breaks for the wealthiest 1 percent of Americans be extended for another 10 years. Let me repeat that. These same Senators on the Republican side who are arguing that we can't extend the unemployment benefits because it would add to the deficit are some of the same Senators who are saying these tax breaks President George Bush and a Republican Congress gave to the wealthiest 1 percent of Americans in 2001 and 2003 should be extended for another 10 years. And they are saying the cost of those tax breaks should not be offset, they should simply be added to the deficit.
So let's be clear about what our Republican friends are saying. They are saying the roughly $33 billion cost of extending unemployment benefits for some of the most desperate workers in our society is unacceptable if it adds to the deficit, but extending tax breaks for the most fortunate and privileged Americans, which would cost a whopping $670 billion over the next decade, well, we can just add that to the deficit. So, again, $33 billion to help people who are out of work, who are desperate, to help them feed their children, stay in their homes, pay their mortgages, keep their families together, that $33 billion we can't spend because it adds to the deficit; however, we can extend these tax breaks that cost $670 billion for another 10 years. Oh, yes, we can add that to the deficit. That is what my Republican friends are saying. Well, this is breathtaking. It is breathtaking to hear this line of argument. It is nothing more than a return to the Bush years when the President, with a Republican majority here, dragged us into trillion dollar wars and turned major surpluses into historic deficits--historic deficits. Well, today, finally, the Senate said: No, we are not going to go any further on this. We drew the line. We had our vote. Shortly, we will vote on passage of the bill--49 days too late.
Imagine, if you will, that you are one of those persons and you have a family. Maybe you have an illness in the family. Maybe you have a child who is sick or a child with a disability or maybe some other unfortunate things have happened to you. Maybe you have been out of work and you lost your unemployment benefits 49 days ago. What have you done for those 49 days? Think about it. Think about what you would do. Well, I am sorry. I apologize to all those Americans, on behalf of the Senate, that we didn't pass this 49 days ago. But the Republican minority would not let us do it because of a filibuster--because of a filibuster--which requires 60 votes. We didn't have 60 votes until today. So I am sorry people had to wait 49 days, but the unemployment extension we will pass today will be retroactive, so it will fill in those last 49 days. I hope and trust that many of the bills that piled up on those kitchen tables--maybe the mortgage payment that wasn't made or maybe the mortgage company is calling all the time and hounding you about it, maybe you have had to go out and get one of those awful payday loans with high interest rates to tide you over--I hope that will soon get taken care of, that you will get your unemployment benefits and be able to pay those off. These will be extended until the end of November. So we can now say to the people who are unemployed: You will get your unemployment benefits until the end of November. And I hope the programs we are working on will turn this economy around.
Tomorrow, the President will sign into law the financial reform bill we passed here last week. This is going to go a long way toward reassuring the markets that we are going to have openness and transparency and that we are going to now deal openly and forthrightly with our financial institutions and demand of them that they deal openly and forthrightly with the American people. I am hopeful the economy will turn around, but the economists say things are still kind of dicey. Well, if that is the case, our obligation is to make sure we have a safety net, and the biggest safety net of all is unemployment insurance benefits.
I am sorry we had to wait 49 days because of Republican intransigence and their raising the filibuster on this, but we finally got it done today, and pretty soon those checks will be going out to our American families. I just hope we don't have to keep extending it. I hope the economy turns around. But if it doesn't--if it doesn't--I say to my Republican friends right now, as we go into next year, these tax breaks they want to extend for the wealthiest 1 percent, I am sorry, that is going to have to take a backseat to the people who are unemployed in this country. We need to make sure we do everything possible to get them jobs, to get them back to work, and to make sure they get the unemployment benefits they need until such time as those jobs do return.
Madam President, with that, I yield the floor, and I suggest the absence of a quorum.
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