The same week most Americans enjoyed a break on Labor Day, the federal holiday intended to celebrate American workers, jobless benefits for millions of Americans who have not yet found work are ending.
On his Twitter account, Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) voiced his support for cuts to unemployment insurance Tuesday, tweeting, “Um, get a job? There are millions of vacancies, and small businesses across the Nation are desperate for workers.”
Cruz accompanied his comments with a retweet of a local news report headline that read, “Jobless Americans have few options as benefits expire.”
While some conservatives agreed with the callous sentiment, the Texas senator’s tweet garnered swift condemnation.
“I wish someone would take yours,” wrote Molly Jong-Fast.
“If only there was some kind of job that paid $174k to tweet and fly to Cancun when your state was in crisis,” tweeted one woman.
Others pointed out that just because the overall number of available jobs — roughly 10 million — seems high, it does not mean those are quality, well-paying positions.
“The longer people defy the labor market the more companies have to raise wages to compete,” another user wrote. “Wages have been stagnant since the 70’s (compared to inflation.) This period of wage inflation is long overdue.”
Applications for unemployment benefits have decreased, hitting a pandemic low at the end of August with just 340,000 submissions.
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