29,500 long-term unemployed Michigan workers lose benefits

Job Market Monitor

Nearly 30,000 “long-term” unemployed workers in Michigan—those out of work for more than 6 months—had their Extended Benefits (EB) assistance abruptly disqualified as of February 18. The EB assistance is the last extension program available for workers who have exhausted all other forms of emergency unemployment compensation. The disqualification comes as a result of new federal thresholds established in the bipartisan unemployment extension legislation passed by Congress and the Obama administration in December 2011.

Under the EB program, unemployed workers have traditionally been entitled to five months of extended unemployment assistance. However, for most on the program, the recent lapse was announced after only four weeks of extension benefits.

The program was terminated because the official state unemployment rate dropped under the newly established 9.9 percent threshold in January. Michigan currently has an official unemployment rate of 9.3 percent. The real unemployment rate, among other measures of social conditions in the economically decimated manufacturing state, is far higher.

Source: wsws.org

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