On the recordJune 22, 2010
I compliment my friend and colleague, Senator Stabenow from Michigan, not only for putting this together but for being a clarion voice to the American people. She is one of those-- and it is sometimes all too rare here--who talks through all the miasma and the fog, and all the barriers, directly to the average American. That is a rare talent and one that she shows repeatedly. I thank her for that. I want to follow up on something my colleague from Rhode Island just mentioned, Senator Reed, which is this idea that people don't want to work, and if we extend their unemployment benefits, we are going to develop a lazy class of people. Let me tell you my experience. It is not that the rate of unemployment is the highest it has been since World War II, although it is far too high. That dubious honor goes to 1982, when it was 10.8 percent in that recession. The difference with this recession is that people are employed for a much longer period of time and, second, it goes way up into the middle class and upper middle class--people who have worked hard their whole lives.
