Unemployment Insurance And What Happens To People Who Run Out

Using the most recent available data, the GAO found that of the 2 million people who lost jobs and ran out of unemployment insurance from 2007 to 2009, only 35 percent had found work by January 2010. Eighteen percent left the workforce and 46 percent remained totally unemployed (twice the jobless rate for "exhaustees" before the recession). Just 18 percent received some type of Social Security benefit and 15 percent received food stamps. Less than 3 percent landed on welfare. (Other studies have suggested the economy is pushing new waves of workers onto Social Security disability rolls.)