The White House stressed Friday that the enhanced unemployment benefits are only temporary.
When asked about the disappointing job numbers in April, and if he felt enhanced unemployment benefits were keeping people home as opposed to rejoining the workforce, President Biden flatly said “no.”
However earlier Friday, Biden stressed that the enhanced benefits are only temporary, something echoed by National Economic Council director Brian Deese and White House press secretary Jen Psaki.
“[The] temporary boost in unemployment benefits that ended, that we enacted, I should say, helped people who lost their jobs through no fault of their own, and who still may be in the process of getting vaccinated. But it’s going to expire in 90 days. That makes sense it expires in 90 days,” Biden said from Rehoboth Beach, Delaware, Friday after the May jobs numbers were released.
Psaki also stressed the temporary nature of the unemployment benefits during Friday’s White House press briefing while not directly answering whether the President believed the enhanced benefits were keeping people from returning to the workforce.
“It is important for people to understand, factually, that the President, no one from the administration, has ever proposed making these permanent or doing it over the long term and sometimes I think that that was just an effort an effort to make that clear in the public,” Psaki said.
She added that the governors who are choosing to end the enhanced benefits in their states, something she called a “political decision,” are doing so for June, so they have no data to look at the impact that might have on the job market.
“I don’t think we can evaluate the data that hasn’t been applied in states across the country yet. And what we’re really talking about from state to state is governors making a decision to pull back on accepting unemployment benefits for six weeks or eight weeks. That’s it, it hasn’t even started yet,” she added. “So I would leave it to all of you and your outside analysts to decide whether that is a big factor in terms of economy and data or whether that is a political discussion we’re having.”
Some context: More than 20 Republican-led states have decided to end the enhanced unemployment benefits early as those governors claim the enhanced benefits are keeping Americans from returning to the labor market. At least four states will offer return-to-work bonuses instead.
Psaki said the administration still thinks the benefits will help those still out of work and Americans should still receive them – up until September.
