NOTE: (June 30, 2009)
(Reuters) The lengthy recession has proved discouraging for the swelling ranks of unemployed Americans, and forced U.S. states obligated to pay them jobless benefits to pile debt on their already strained budgets. Fifteen states have depleted their unemployment insurance funds so far, forcing them to borrow from the U.S. Treasury. A record 30 of the country’s 50 states are expected to have to borrow up to $17 billion by next year, said Rick McHugh of the National Employment Law Project, a nonpartisan advocacy group. “We are setting the stage for big pressures for states to restrict eligibility and benefit levels,” McHugh said. “Those type of restrictive actions undercut the (Depression-era program’s) economic and social stability purposes.”
