The jobless benefits bill is now off to the House for approval after being passed in the Senate 60-40. It’s a big relief for 2.5 million jobless people who have been waiting for the unemployment extension to pass.
Now the question is, who will get what?
It passed the Senate and now head to the House. President Obama is slated to sign the bill on Wednesday.
Jobless benefits could be restored, retroatively, as early as Thursday.
The extension will fund those benefits through November.
Everyone who has been laid off is eligible for the first 26 weeks of jobless benefits BUT:
Then there are the tiers:
The first 34 weeks, beyond that initial 26, are available to most everyone.
Only states with high unemployment will be eligible for the next two tiers of extended benefits. That means states with over 6 percent unemployment will be eligible for an additional 13 weeks. Additionally, states with over 8.5 percent unemployment rates will be eligible for another 6 weeks beyond that.
There is no 5th tier:
This stripped down bill doesn’t include the 5th tier that was initially proposed. That would have offered more than 99 weeks total to laid off workers areas with extremely high unemployment.
Then the whole process starts again at the end of November…but that’s a long shot