Brother Could You Spare a Dime?

With the election of Carte Goodwin to succeed the late Senator Byrd, the Senate was able to secure the filibuster-breaking vote to pass the bill that would extend jobless benefits to the unemployed across this nation. Though proposed as a Democrat bill, the majority party was able to find support for the benefit extension from Republicans Olympia Snowe and Susan Collins of Maine. However, the majority of Republican senators voted against the bill.

What makes this bill so ambiguous is that the short term results of such an overhaul could result in small relief to the economy and will help those who are in desperate need of financial aid, yet the ramifications of the long term consequences may be far greater than the small good it had first done. To see the example of what it does, we look back at the Bush administration when they to extended unemployment benefits. The end result of that decision did not result in people finding more jobs, but we in return found more jobs being lost. Though it may not have been a direct cause of unemployment, it was certainly not an aid in creating jobs.

Senator Mitch McConnel, who voted against the bill said, “We’ve repeatedly voted for similar bills in the past, and are ready to support one now. What we do not support, and we make no apologies, is borrowing tens of billions of dollars to pass this bill in a time when the national debt is spinning completely out-of-control.” I would have to agree with Senator McConnel that they should not vote for jobless aid that is not paid for in such an economy, yet I would argue that causing deficits through such bills in a good economy is what leads to the bad economy.

We find ourselves in a time in which a majority of unemployment insurance comes from government, so until reconciliation can be found for that I can’t really find unemployment insurance as being wrong. After all if you paid into it, you ought to receive what has been saved over time. But to simply decide to spend money for the unemployed is not helping anyone in the long term. Businesses may receive a short jolt from new money flow, but the deficits will cause taxes to go higher, which will cause people to stop spending, which will cause businesses to lose money, which will result in more people becoming out of work. It’s true that the unemployed should be helped, and I pray those receiving the benefits will be helped, but our government can no longer afford to borrow money out of the air without there being consequences.

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