About PennsylvaniaUnemployed.org
This website is a joint project of the Philadelphia Unemployment Project (PUP) and Community Legal Services (CLS). These two community-based nonprofit organizations help low-income workers and the unemployed every day to make sure their rights are protected. We also help advocate for better laws and policies for low-income people and families.
The Problem: 99 Weeks
In Pennsylvania, you can currently get up to 99 weeks of unemployment benefits if you lose your job. This may sound generous, but it’s not enough for the 96,000 Pennsylvanians who had exhausted all 99 weeks by February 1, 2011. The "99ers" are hard-working people who just can’t find jobs in this recession and have few places to turn for help. As the recession drags on, there will be more 99ers every day. In fact, the PA Department of Labor estimates that approximately 10,000 Pennsylvanians will exhaust their UC benefits each month through June 2011. These people will be left with no job and little else to help them get by.
Extending UC benefits is seen as one of the most effective ways to stimulate the economy, but plans to go beyond 99 weeks have stalled in Washington. In fact, getting Congress to agree to continue 99 weeks of UC benefits when they were set to expire in November 2010 was a significant challenge. Fortunately, the additional UC benefits that allow for 99 weeks were extended in November, allowing unemployed workers in Pennsylvania to continue receiving 99 weeks of benefits through December 2011.
If extended benefits are not reauthorized in December 2011, though, Pennsylvanians will be back to a maximum of 26 weeks of unemployment benefits--not nearly enough to weather this jobless recovery.
Philadelphia Unemployment Project
Community Legal Services