Oregon Public Broadcasting

Several dozen people gathered in downtown Portland Monday to ask Congress to extend unemployment benefits for people who've been dubbed, "the 99ers."

Kristian Foden-Vencil / OPB

99ers are the growing numbers of people who've exhausted their 99 weeks of unemployment benefits.

Many lost their jobs almost immediately after the stock market crash of 2008 -- and haven't been able to find work since.

Mark Bowman was in the high tech field for over 20 years. He brought a notebook to the event. It's filled with the names and telephone numbers of businesses he's contacted for work.

Mark Bowman: "I've got the double whammy of the economy being really bad, the worst we've had since the 1930's and I am in my 50's.  Now if Roosevelt could make a serious jobs program back in the 30's, I don't see why Obama and the Congress can't do that now. A serious jobs program."

The national unemployment rate dropped in December from 9.8 to 9.4 percent.

New numbers for Oregon are due out next week, but the state has been tracking about one percentage point higher than the nation.