Just before President Joe Biden plans to announce an anti-poverty package next week, a number of Democratic lawmakers have signed an open letter asking the White House to permanently extend the unemployment assistance provided in the first three rounds of anti-poverty relief.
The Wall Street Journal reported that the 40 Democratic lawmakers who signed the letter suggested that Biden should include a series of measures in the latest anti-poverty package, including raising the amount of unemployment benefits, extending the time limit for additional federal benefits, and relaxing eligibility for the unemployed, as well as implementing a new system that would allow the amount of benefits to be adjusted as economic conditions change. The letter said that the Trump administration added federal unemployment benefits for the first time in the first round of relief cases last year, and since the economy is still in the doldrums, the program should be expanded to all unemployed people, while also filling the loopholes in the original protection system so that working employees can also benefit.
Since the outbreak of the epidemic, Congress has introduced three rounds of relief and enacted a number of temporary unemployment benefits, including allowing the unemployed to receive additional benefits from the federal government each week, and Congress recently passed an extension of the $300 weekly benefit until September. The Democratic Party hopes that the Biden administration can seize the opportunity to change the welfare system in the long run. The White House is studying feasible options for this, and has discussed the details with Democratic lawmakers, but it is unknown whether the Biden administration will announce its decision next week. The White House has not responded to media inquiries for the time being.
The Republican Party is opposed to the proposal, saying that if the amount of subsidies increases, the income of the unemployed may be higher than the income from work, and then impact the labor market, and some lawmakers said that the amount of subsidies is too large will affect the treasury.
In addition, the Democratic leadership, such as Speaker of the House Plosi, also demanded that the White House add a section to the anti-poverty program to calm drug prices and allow the Medicare program to negotiate with drug companies. Some have also proposed a permanent increase in the ChildTax Credit, which Biden made clear earlier this week would only increase the rebate for a short time.
After the federal government introduced additional unemployment assistance last year, the number of applications reached a record high, but the state’s unemployment registration system is too old to handle the large number of applications, thus slowing down the release of payments. Officials in both the previous and current administrations have said that computers should be updated as soon as possible and ways should be found to eliminate related fraud.
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