Unemployment Insurance Reform: the facts Why did the legislature reject federal unemployment payments? This is a common misconception. The legislature did not reject these unemployment payments — the federal government refused to grant them to the citizens of North Carolina. State governments do not have the power or the authority to either pay federal benefits or take away federal benefits. In response to the majority’s decision to scale back overly generous state benefits in order to accelerate the repayment of our state’s existing $2.8 billion unemployment debt to the federal government, the federal government refused to grant North Carolina a waiver from federal requirements. Had it treated North Carolina the same way it did four other states (who, perhaps coincidentally, voted for President Obama in 2008 and 2012) the administration would have allowed us to be grandfathered in to the federal benefits program. The Obama administration regularly threatens states with taking away federal dollars when they fail to do as they are told to implement government expansion provisions. Speaker of the House Thom Tillis and Senate President Pro-Tem Phil Berger both implored the federal government to extend federal emergency unemployment benefits to North Carolinians until the end of this year, and to grandfather us into the program as it did for those four other states. The Obama administration denied their request. I heard that 170,000 people lost their unemployment benefits. That’s a number that has no basis in fact and is nothing more than hysterical political spin. According to Assistant Secretary of Employment Security Dale Folwell, a total of only 68,259 people were eligible for federal emergency unemployment benefits in North Carolina — far too many, of course, but a far cry from the inflated number claimed by liberal advocacy groups. But why did the legislature slash current state benefits for the unemployed? They didn’t. Unemployment benefits for those who received them before July 1, 2013 remain unchanged. What the legislature did was scale back the maximum weekly unemployment benefit from $525 (the fifth highest in the nation and the highest of our neighboring states) to $350 a week to be more in line with other states in the region (Alabama pays out at $265, Florida at $275, Georgia at $330, Kentucky at $415, South Carolina at $326, and Tennessee at $275). And reducing this maximum benefit level will affect only higher-income earners. Bringing North Carolina’s unemployment benefits more in line with our neighboring states will save us an additional $250 million — and allow us to pay back our debt to the federal government by the third quarter of 2015 (according to the latest projections). Even the North Carolina Justice Center, a liberal advocacy group, agrees with the need for reform: “Fiscal health will require that North Carolina pay down the existing loan balance and put in place a forward-financing system that can best support the system in good times or bad.” (From Getting Solvent: Rebuilding the Unemployment Insurance Trust Fund to Protect North Carolina’s Economy, Budget and Tax Center Reports, May 2012.) Doesn’t the new law cut back how long I get a government check? Yes. The duration of state unemployment benefits under the new law is scaled back from 26 to a minimum of 20 weeks (with that number being tied to the current unemployment rate and adjusted twice a year, so it may end up being more). It’s estimated that this adjustment will save between $230 million and $440 million annually — and close the current shortfall immediately... Read more about our Unemployment Insurance Reform efforts here: nchouse116/unemployment-reform-the-facts/
Posted on: Thu, 22 Aug 2013 01:12:36 +0000
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