House Majority Leader Dick Armey issued a statement through a spokesman, defending the refusal to approve the Senate version of extended unemployment benefits. “The House will not address the issue due to the exorbitant costs associated with it,” he said. The House Republican leadership balks at $5 billion for the unemployed, but has no problem awarding hundreds of billions for war or trillions for tax cuts to the wealthy.
In any case, the budgetary impact of the extended benefits is nil, since there is a $25 billion surplus in the federal trust fund, financed by payroll taxes, from which unemployment compensation benefits are paid. The denial of extended benefits is thus a deliberate and gratuitous decision to drive down the living standards of that section of the working class which is in the gravest financial straits—the long-term unemployed.
The role of the White House is particularly cynical. Bush refused to act on the appeals to work out a compromise between the House and Senate versions. At a briefing during Bush’s trip to Eastern Europe, press secretary Ari Fleischer refused to answer six direct questions on whether Bush favored extending unemployment benefits, repeatedly declaring that this was something for the House and Senate to decide.
In any case, the budgetary impact of the extended benefits is nil, since there is a $25 billion surplus in the federal trust fund, financed by payroll taxes, from which unemployment compensation benefits are paid. The denial of extended benefits is thus a deliberate and gratuitous decision to drive down the living standards of that section of the working class which is in the gravest financial straits—the long-term unemployed.
The role of the White House is particularly cynical. Bush refused to act on the appeals to work out a compromise between the House and Senate versions. At a briefing during Bush’s trip to Eastern Europe, press secretary Ari Fleischer refused to answer six direct questions on whether Bush favored extending unemployment benefits, repeatedly declaring that this was something for the House and Senate to decide.