If you're unemployed, you get 26 weeks of benefits, distributed by your state. When those run out, you can apply for additional benefits from the federal government, that last up to 73 weeks. Those extra benefits from the federal government, though, are set to vanish next year, unless lawmakers decide to renew them.
The first group affected would be those receiving the final 13 to 20 weeks of unemployment benefits. Recipients of Extended Benefits will stop receiving benefits at the end of this year, unless Congress acts. At last count, there were more than 500,000 people receiving these benefits.
Recipients of federally funded Emergency Unemployment Compensation, which provides up to 53 weeks of benefits, would see payments stop at different points in 2012, depending on what phase they are in of receiving them. If they have not yet begun to receive them by the new year, they wouldn't be eligible at all. There are more than 3 million people currently receiving these benefits, the latest data show.
