Expanded eligibility sought for jobless
By Brian Tumulty
Gannett News Service
WASHINGTON — The Labor Department plans to release $8 billion in new grants to state governments this week that some advocacy groups say should be partly used to expand who is eligible for unemployment benefits.
The $8 billion from federal unemployment trust funds must be used for state-run employment services programs, but have no strings attached in terms of how much can be used for administrative expenses or to reduce employer payroll taxes.
The payout was part of an economic stimulus package signed into law by President Bush on Saturday. Besides the grants, states will receive federal aid in providing extended benefits to the estimated 800,000 unemployed workers who have exhausted their state benefits.
In most states, including Hawai'i, the extended benefits will last up to 13 weeks, meaning thousands of jobless Hawai'i residents are in line for a whole year of unemployment benefits.
After Sept. 11, the state extended unemployment benefits to nine months. Now that Bush has signed the bill, the state will add another three months of weekly checks for many of the unemployed, said Tom Jackson, spokesman for the Department of Labor and Industrial Relations.
More than 15,000 Hawai'i residents were claiming unemployment benefits in early March — almost twice the number of people claiming benefits in March 2001.
In seven high unemployment states — Arkansas, Idaho, Massachusetts, Michigan, Nevada, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin — a total of 26 weeks of federal benefits will be available.
And in three other states — Alaska, Oregon and Washington — the federal benefits will extend up to 39 weeks.
However, federal unemployment benefits are available only to jobless workers who qualify under their state's eligibility rules. Only 43 percent of the nation's unemployed workers qualified for unemployment benefits in 2001, even though the payroll taxes that pay for the program are nearly universal among salaried and hourly employees.
The AFL-CIO and three advocacy groups said at a press conference yesterday that coverage could be expanded to part-time workers and people with a short work history at a cost of less than $1 billion.
Wendell Primus of the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, an advocacy group for low-income Americans, predicted that much of the $8 billion will be used for state administrative expenses and to bolster state trust funds.
"And then the remainder will be divided between employers and laborers in terms of improved benefits and employer taxes cuts," Primus said. "I'm worried that employers will get the better end of the deal."
Reform advocates said the U.S. unemployment benefits program needs "significant repair" because less than half of jobless workers participate and many of those who do will lose eligibility before they find work, a study found.
"The current system, a state-by-state patchwork of policies and provisions, is rife with shortcomings and inequities," according to a study by the Economic Policy Institute, the Center for Budget and Policy Priorities and the National Employment Law Project. "Many states have not adopted the provisions necessary to weather an economic downturn like the one the economy is now experiencing."
Almost 1.4 million workers exhausted jobless benefits between Sept. 11 and Jan. 30 after the 26-week limit on their payments expired, the study found.
In the first half of this year, the number of jobless workers who will collect benefits for the duration of their eligibility may reach 2.1 million, it said. The study also said Hawai'i, Oregon and Wisconsin were the only states to extend the number of weeks an unemployed worker could receive benefits after Sept. 11.
