Title: Unemployment benefits will end for millions without more stimulus
Headings: Millions poised to lose unemployment benefits in ‘enormous cliff’ at year’s end
Millions poised to lose unemployment benefits in ‘enormous cliff’ at year’s end
Key Points
Scars for a generation
Benefits for gig workers
Extra 13 weeks
Inequality
Extended benefits

Content: There are about 3.3 million workers getting PEUC benefits, according to the Labor Department. The program ends after Dec. 31. A prior measure paying workers an extra $600 a week in unemployment benefits lapsed at the end of July. Absent that boost, state benefits generally replace about half of workers’ prior wages. Inequality
Failure to extend these benefit programs would hit low-wage earners hardest, Kimmel said. Job loss was concentrated among such workers in March and April, and their jobs have been slower than higher earners to bounce back. “A society that already was becoming increasingly unequal will just become even more unequal [without benefit extensions],” Kimmel said. Extended benefits
Many people who exhaust their state’s allotment of unemployment insurance would be eligible to continue getting benefits after the end of the year via state extended benefits programs. These benefits become available in states with high levels of unemployment and typically pay up to 13 to 20 extra weeks, according to the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities. Workers can collect these benefits after exhausting the 13 extra weeks of PEUC, for example.