This article originally provided by The Charleston Gazette

November 8, 2010

Gary Zuckett: Extend jobless benefits

CHARLESTON, W.Va. -- The polls have closed and the votes have been counted. Now it is time for another vote to be taken -- for the sake of millions of Americans, for our economy and for our country.

Members of Congress will return to work in mid-November. Gov. Manchin will most likely be seated when Congress reconvenes this month. Together, they will immediately face a crucial decision: whether to extend unemployment benefits. If they fail to act, it will indeed be a grim holiday season for too many.

The nonpartisan National Employment Law Project estimates that 2 million Americans -- including more than 10,000 workers who lost employment during the recession here in West Virginia -- will lose unemployment benefits by early December if no extension is forthcoming.

Some look at the recent election results and argue, "Didn't the American people just vote against government spending?"

No, there were a variety of reasons people voted the way they did. According to the polls, the majority of Americans favor helping the unemployed, just as they favor letting the Bush-era tax cuts expire for the wealthiest Americans and just as they favor preserving programs such as Medicare for seniors and others in peril during this economic crisis.

The number one issue to most Americans is not government spending. It's jobs and the economy. For the sake of this country, Congress should make restoring the economy their number one priority when they return to Washington. Democrats should realize that they were elected to do a job -- and they should do it. Republicans should realize that with (even partial) leadership comes responsibility -- and Tuesday's election was not a referendum on how we should treat people who are unemployed through no fault of their own.

Congress could debate for months the various ways of stimulating jobs and the economy, but the quickest, most effective way to achieve at least some success would be to extend unemployment benefits immediately, in time to save what might otherwise be another dismal holiday season for retailers.

Economists argue, and the National Employment Law Project notes, that unemployment benefits stimulate growth. Why? Because unemployed people spend their benefits on necessities -- mortgage payments, utilities, food, items at the discount store. The National Employment Law Project says this spending may have created 1.15 million jobs in 2010 alone. 

None of us know when the economy will improve. But government can speed up the process -- especially as we enter the holiday season. The U.S. economy depends on the holidays. The retail industry accounts for 13.4 percent of the nation's private sector workforce. Department stores, electronics chains and discounters count on holiday sales for more than one-fifth of their total annual revenues.

We've seen what happens when unemployed people don't shop. In 2008, before Congress approved benefits for the newly unemployed, holiday sales dropped nearly four percent from the previous year. It was the first decline in sales we witnessed since the Department of Commerce began tracking retail sales in 1992.

During the disastrous 2008 holiday season, retailers hired only 231,000 workers, well under half of the 618,000 hired one year earlier. Fewer sales mean fewer jobs. Fewer jobs mean a sluggish economy and longer unemployment. And the cruel and vicious cycle of the Great Recession continues. We can stop it if we act quickly.

Zuckett is executive director of WV Citizen Action Group, a consumer watchdog organization founded in 1974.