June 30, 2008
Detroit Free Press

Bush signs extension of unemployment benefits

By Todd Spangler

WASHINGTON – President George W. Bush has signed a spending bill today that includes a 13-week extension of unemployment benefits, a measure expected to be of great help to people in states such as Michigan struggling with high unemployment rates.

The Associated Press reported this morning that Bush had signed the bill, which represented a compromise with the Democratic-controlled House and Senate, which insisted on an extension of unemployment benefits as necessary during the nation’s economic downturn. The legislation also included additional money for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and greater college benefits for troops and veterans.

Initially, Democrats had argued that states with particularly high unemployment rates, like Michigan’s -- which led the nation at 8.5% in May -- should receive an additional 13-week extension, but the White House balked at such a plan.

Under the legislation, as many as 226,000 Michigan workers could get benefits under the deal and the state could begin providing the extension cash to beneficiaries by the end of July, depending on how long the process of receiving and administering the benefit from the federal government taxes. The states administer unemployment benefits, but the funding for the extension will come from the feds.

The extension covers people exhausting U-I benefits between November 2006 and March 2009, meaning that once the program is up and running, people who have already lost their benefits since November 2006 will be able to reapply for the 13-week extension. Those receiving benefits at the time the program kicks in, wouldn’t have to reapply, the extension starting automatically.