Many of those existing unemployment extensions were going to run out during the holiday season, hence they're going to keep the extensions going. Employers are
not secure enough to bring people back on board, and they won't be for quite a while. Here in NY, they're saying that for every 5 people currently being laid off, only 2 are expected to find suitable work within the next 2-3 years.
They could have let the extensions run out, pointed to the lower unemployment numbers and started popping champagne corks... but when the overall jobless (the "discouraged") rate is
currently close to 17.5%, that jobless rate would have burst over 20%.
Yay, Stimulus!
