- Are unemployment benefits no longer temporary?, By Michael A. Fletcher and Dana Hedgpeth, March 9, 2010, Washington Post: “Millions of Americans have been forced to rely on unemployment payments for extended periods as the nation struggles through its longest period of high joblessness in a generation, and critics are taking aim, saying that the Depression-era program created as a temporary bridge for laid-off workers is turning into an expensive entitlement. About 11.4 million out-of-work people now collect unemployment compensation, at a cost of $10 billion a month. Half of them have been receiving payments for more than six months, the usual insurance limit. But under multiple extensions enacted by the federal government in response to the downturn, workers can collect the payments for as long as 99 weeks in states with the highest unemployment rates — the longest period since the program’s inception…”
- Jobless aid measure clears Senate hurdle, By Andrew Taylor (AP), March 9, 2010, Washington Post: “Legislation to give additional months of unemployment benefits to people who have been out of a job for more than half a year cleared a key hurdle Tuesday that guarantees it will soon pass the Senate. The sweeping bill also would prevent doctors from absorbing a crippling cut in Medicare payments and extends health insurance subsidies for the unemployed through December. It would add $132 billion to the budget deficit over the next year and a half. Eight Republicans voted with Democrats to defeat a GOP filibuster of the measure, setting up a final vote on Wednesday. The measure illustrates the great extent to which direct help for the jobless and the poor makes up a large portion of Democrats’ election-year agenda on jobs – and that it threatens to squeeze out other items on that agenda amid concerns about a budget deficit projected at a record $1.6 trillion this year…”
Day: March 9, 2010
Millennium Villages – Africa
Shower of aid brings flood of progress, By Jeffrey Gettleman, March 8, 2010, New York Times: “In the past five years, life in this bushy little patch of western Kenya has improved dramatically. Agricultural yields have doubled; child mortality has dropped by 30 percent; school attendance has shot up and so have test scores, putting one local school second in the area, when it used to be ranked 17th; and cellphone ownership (a telltale sign of prosperity in rural Africa) has increased fourfold. There is a palpable can-do spirit that infuses the muddy lanes and family compounds walled off by the fruity-smelling lantana bushes. People who have grown bananas for generations are learning to breed catfish, and women who used to be terrified of bees are now lulling them to sleep with smoke and harvesting the honey. ‘I used to think, African killer bees, no way,’ said Judith Onyango, one of the new honey makers. But now, she added, with visible pride, ‘I’m an apiarist.’ Sauri was the first of what are now more than 80 Millennium Villages across Africa, a showcase project that was the dream child of Jeffrey D. Sachs, the Harvard-trained, Columbia University economist who runs with an A-list crowd: Bono, both Bills (Clinton and Gates), George Soros, Kofi Annan, Ban Ki-moon and others…”
Dental Coverage for Low-income Children – Iowa
Low-income Iowans can receive dental care under new program, By Charlotte Eby, March 5, 2010, Sioux City Journal: “Children from low- to moderate-income families in Iowa are now eligible for dental coverage under a state program Gov. Chet Culver said is the first dental-only program in the country. Officials expect as many as 22,000 children could enroll in program that began March 1. It provides routine dental care as well as medically necessary orthodontia, but not cosmetic orthodontia…”