White House presses Congress for jobless benefits

The White House is stepping up its push for Congress to extend unemployment insurance for out-of-work Americans, linking the benefits to an extension of expiring Bush-era tax cuts.

President Barack Obama's Council of Economic Advisers on Thursday reported that if Congress does not extend the benefits, two million unemployed workers will lose coverage this month and 7 million would lose coverage by November 2011.

The report says the benefits have a broad impact because recipients spend the money they receive and sustain employment elsewhere in the economy. The economic advisers estimate that the unemployment benefits translated into 800,000 more jobs and a gross domestic product that was 0.8 percent higher in September 2010.

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