The Good News
Well, it looks like the Senate did pass the extension to unemployment insurance, in a vote on April 7th at 59 to 38. Great news! That would mean an extension on unemployment benefits for almost 3 million Americans who are out of work. Rather than most people getting about 26 weeks of unemployment insurance, the Senate bipartisan federal extension for unemployment would mean that most eligible Americans would get somewhere in the region of 46 - 63 weeks:
The Bad News
The House of Representatives, the next part of the federal government the deal had to go through, wouldn't vote to pass it. The problem is that the Senate is in a Democrat majority, whilst the House has a Republican majority. This creates an awful lot of gridlock, and it happens very often. The Senate even drew up an amended bill, but the House still showed little interest - especially the House Speaker, John Boehner (Ohio), who says he won't support a bill that doesn't include measures to create jobs.As of 9th July, the unemployment extension has not been agreed and it looks to stay that way for the time being. Not great. Here's a video, though, of Harry Reid (Senate Majority Leader) saying that the extension is up to Boehner just two weeks ago:
You might also like to check out this question that someone asked about the extension back in May:
//employment.blurtit.com/4025304/did-the-senate-pass-the-unemployment-extension-2014
