UNEMPLOYMENT BENEFITS

Doc Thompson subbed for Glenn Beck today and asked his listeners how long is too long for someone to receive unemployment benefits. I think his preferred answer is somewhere between 1 and 4 weeks but what was noteworthy is not one of his callers said that the length should depend on the state of the economy.

The conservatives, like Nina Easton, have been harping about this for several months now and it seems that they don't care if millions of people are denied UI benefits. Unlike a real small business owner, they can't seem to grasp that lowering consumer demand will only hurt the economy:

The fact that many small firms are seeing little increase in demand for their services and products is decisive for Scott George, owner of Mid-America Dental & Hearing Center, which employs 55 people in the southwestern Missouri town of Mount Vernon.

"I'm not having any trouble getting money," said George, who recently got a $250,000 loan to renovate one of his buildings. But he's not hiring more workers because of little or no growth in sales.

"If I got more people coming through the front door, then I'd need more people to take care of them," George said.