By Brian Mudd Today’s entry: I’ve heard you discuss the negative consequences of extended and supplemental unemployment benefits. Thank you, my business is among the impacted. My question is if we know how many people would likely go back to work if it weren’t for the extended unemployment benefits? Bottom Line: There’s no way to give you a hard number but I can give you a pretty good idea. According to the last month’s job report from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, there are 9,812,000 people collecting unemployment. Incidentally, despite record job openings being posted and increased job openings due to pandemic restrictions being rolled back in various states, there are 102,000 more people collecting unemployment today than a month ago. The bottom line is that it’s a fact that many have opted to collect unemployment with federal supplemental assistance as opposed to going back to work. This isn’t a surprise, as this phenomenon has played out regarding welfare benefits previously. In terms of figuring out how many of the near ten million people on unemployment are collecting by choice, I’m going to use opening data.