Tom Harkin: “I thank the Senator, who has been a champion of working people and families for all the many years I have known him, and…”

“I thank the Senator, who has been a champion of working people and families for all the many years I have known him, and that is many years now. I thank him for telling us about what the CBO said in the deficit commission. I pointed out a couple of things earlier. The Senator is right on the mark in terms of economic activity, and that is why it is so important right now to get the economy moving again, to keep it moving. The biggest bang for the buck we get is food stamps. People spend those right away on food. Second to that, for every dollar we put into unemployment benefits, it causes $1.63 of economic activity. That is not a bad return on the dollar. Well, down here on the chart, extending the Bush tax cuts, you only get 49 cents back. That is what my Republican friends say you need to do--more of these Bush tax cuts. That is dismal. Yet an infrastructure investment brings $1.59 cents. If you invest more in infrastructure--sewer and water, plants and highways, roads, bridges, high-speed rail--not only do you get a great return, you get a lot of people employed at the same time. How can we leave here tomorrow or Friday, when we leave for 10 or 12 days, when we know this is what is happening? At the end of last week, 1,350,000 Americans lost their unemployment benefits. At the end of this week, it jumps up to 1,720,000. By July 10, before we come back, it will be 2,140,000 Americans who will lose their benefits.”