The High Cost Of Unemployment

As Congress continues to dither over extending long term benefits for the unemployed, the human cost continues to mount.

Numerous articles, including some here at The Fiscal Times, have documented the economic damage that long-term unemployment and the loss of federal benefits has done to jobless workers. But the damage is not all economic. Unemployment is a significant risk factor for substance abuse, which leads to a wide array of social ills, from drunk driving to the break-up of families.

These are costs that eventually get passed on to the rest of us in one form or another.

By: Stuart Shapiro

Stuart is a professor and the Director of the Public Policy
program at the Bloustein School of Planning and Public Policy at Rutgers
University. He teaches economics and cost-benefit analysis and studies
regulation in the United States at both the federal and state levels.
Prior to coming to Rutgers, Stuart worked for five years at the Office
of Management and Budget in Washington under Presidents Clinton and
George W. Bush.