Let me preface this blog by stating that unemployment extensions will not help me and mine in any way. My husband is currently working, and we went through our benefits after our shop closed. So this is not for personal gain.
I am horrified by the actions of the Senate towards the unemployed in America. Twice now, rather than discussing an extension they’ve gone on vacation. Paid vacation. By the way, Someone in PR was not thinking when they used the word vacation, seriously. Way to taunt the unemployed.
I understand deficit spending needs to stop, but why draw the line in the sane when for once congress can help actual individual people instead of say... wall street, which by the way, screwed over our entire economy and everyone who actually made the mistakes kept their jobs.
There is so much wasteful spending going on that no one will EVER touch, but they’re going to let people starve. Unemployment helps the economy. It keeps people spending when they have no jobs. Also, people seem very confused by this bill. It is not granting more benefits. It is allowing benefits that are already in place to continue. People throw around words like “99 weeks” as though they know what they are talking about. Let me explain.
Most people are not awarded the full amount possible for unemployment, which is I believe 350 dollars a week for twenty weeks. Most people are given between 150 and 250 for 15 to 18 weeks. Then the next tier gives you a fraction of that, and the next tier is a fraction of that fraction and so on. It is constant uncertainty as to whether there will be a next tier, so no, it is not a disincentive to work.
In any case, unemployed americans are not where we should start making our budget cuts. It doesn’t cut enough to be helpful first of all, and it will hurt the economy. The point of this post was to lead up to.... this thing I wrote
We the People: By Kaitlin Bevis
We the people of the United States of America are enraged! As you take your paid vacation on the taxpayers dime we sit unemployed and frightened. We are in a great hour of need and you sit idly by and do nothing. The time has come to say enough!
What made America great was that we were not ruled by a King in a far off castle untouched by his citizens troubles. We chose our leaders and they lived down the street. What made our country great was that we could walk into the White House at any time and demand to see the President we put into power. What made our country great was that once upon a time a man could write a hand written letter to the Supreme Court and change the nation. Our Country was great, and now it is desperate.
As you sit upon your thrones in your mansions we lose our homes. As you take your vacations on our dime and eat like Kings, your subjects are starving. While you rest assured of your children's health and future with prepaid college plans and free insurance, we are spending our children's hard earned college funds just to get by.
There will always be those who take advantage of the system, just as there will always be Senators, Representatives, Governors, and other public officials who consistently vote against their citizens wishes to help the corporations. Do we take away all of your jobs because of a few (haha) bad eggs, no. We continue to pay your ridiculous salaries, your private healthcare, your children's college funds, your golden pensions, and your ever wish and whim, yet you would look down upon us from your mighty throne and declare that we are not working hard enough, trying hard enough, looking hard enough. You accuse us of taking advantage? Of increasing the deficit? Every dime you make comes from money our nation no longer has.
If you really wanted to help your citizens, you would refuse your mansions until each of your citizens had homes. You would not take paid vacations until you were assured there was a job available for every single citizen under your care. You would not accept your benefits until you were sure each and every citizen had healthcare and retirement plans set into place. You would not send your children to college on our dime until you could promise every child in the United States would have an opportunity to make the best of themselves in a college campus somewhere.
You would not shout socialism and big government as you lived of our dime. You would NOT bail out the banks responsible for sending our economy down the drain, you would have given that money to the people to pay off their houses and credit cards, which would in turn give money back to the banks. You penalize companies that give their jobs to anyone other than American Citizens. You would not vacation while our troops are fighting a war you seem to have lost interest in. You would not rest while our oceans and coastlines are being destroyed by corporate greed.
We the people of the United States of America are Unemployed, We are Hungry, We are Homeless, We are Frightened, but we are not Helpless. We say enough!
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