A Republican proposal to pare back enhanced unemployment benefits to about 70% of what a worker earned prior to losing their job — as opposed to the previous weekly payment of $600 across the board — would take most states between two to five months to implement, likely causing delays in relief for tens of millions of people.
That’s according to a memo (pdf) presented to Congress last week by the National Association of State Workforce Agencies (NASWA), an organization representing state agencies that administer unemployment benefits and other programs.
The memo, obtained by NPR over the weekend, warned that replacing the flat weekly payment with a more complicated individualized benefit based on prior income “would take 8 to 20 weeks or more” for most states to fully implement, depending on the formula the White House and GOP ultimately propose.
Such an implementation delay “could mean a huge gap in payments and a bigger backlog for millions,” noted NPR correspondent Kelsey Snell.
As NPR reported Saturday, “the potential delays are so significant that the U.S. Department of Labor told Congress in May that it ‘strongly’ opposed such a change because states would find it ‘exceedingly difficult if not impossible to implement.'”
The Labor Department, according to a document obtained by NPR, told the House Ways and Means Committee that “states would find it exceedingly difficult, if not impossible to implement a unique payment amount in addition to the various benefit payments to which the [Federal Pandemic Unemployment Compensation] applies.”
Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.), one of the architects of the $600-per-week benefit provided under the CARES Act, tweeted Saturday that “you know Republicans are in pretty bad shape when they have to go with a plan based on rough ideas that Donald Trump’s own Secretary of Labor says are unworkable.”
You know Republicans are in pretty bad shape when they have to go with a plan based on rough ideas that Donald Trump’s own Secretary of Labor says are unworkable. https://t.co/1jpIM5cuAo
— Ron Wyden (@RonWyden) July 25, 2020
The last weekly unemployment check with the flat $600 boost went out in 49 states on Saturday and in New York on Sunday as Congress failed to approve an extension before leaving town for the weekend. Unemployment benefits are set to revert to pre-pandemic levels starting August 1 if Congress does not act.
With tens of millions of Americans facing a massive drop in income in mere days, White House officials on Sunday floated the possibility of quickly passing a narrow bill extending boosted unemployment benefits and granting liability protections to corporations, a top priority of Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) and the business lobby.
“Honestly I see us being able to provide unemployment insurance, maybe a retention credit to keep people from being displaced or brought back into the workplace, helping with our schools — if we can do that along with liability protections perhaps we put that forward, get that passed as we negotiate on the rest of the bill in the weeks to come,” White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows said in an interview Sunday on ABC.
McConnell is expected to unveil the GOP’s full coronavirus stimulus package on Monday after delaying release of the legislation due to intraparty disagreements over unemployment benefits and other key issues.
The Washington Post reported Sunday that instead of simply extending the $600-per-week boost in unemployment benefits, Republicans have “discussed a formula that would amount to 70 percent wage replacement of the salary a worker was getting paid before getting laid off.”
“Some economists say the new formula would effectively take the $600 weekly payment to around $200 a week,” the Post noted, “though [Treasury Secretary Steve] Mnuchin stressed on Sunday it would vary from person to person.”
Josh Bivens, research director for the Economic Policy Institute, estimates that reducing the enhanced unemployment payments to $200 per week would cost the United States 3.4 million jobs over the next year.
In a series of tweets on Friday, Rep. Don Beyer (D-Va.) warned that “the damage from a lapse in unemployment benefits will radiate throughout the economy.”
“Any future extension will come too late to help those who are evicted, who lose their jobs, businesses, or health coverage, and those who go hungry,” said Beyer. “This is a dark moment for our country.”
Truthout Is Preparing to Meet Trump’s Agenda With Resistance at Every Turn
Dear Truthout Community,
If you feel rage, despondency, confusion and deep fear today, you are not alone. We’re feeling it too. We are heartsick. Facing down Trump’s fascist agenda, we are desperately worried about the most vulnerable people among us, including our loved ones and everyone in the Truthout community, and our minds are racing a million miles a minute to try to map out all that needs to be done.
We must give ourselves space to grieve and feel our fear, feel our rage, and keep in the forefront of our mind the stark truth that millions of real human lives are on the line. And simultaneously, we’ve got to get to work, take stock of our resources, and prepare to throw ourselves full force into the movement.
Journalism is a linchpin of that movement. Even as we are reeling, we’re summoning up all the energy we can to face down what’s coming, because we know that one of the sharpest weapons against fascism is publishing the truth.
There are many terrifying planks to the Trump agenda, and we plan to devote ourselves to reporting thoroughly on each one and, crucially, covering the movements resisting them. We also recognize that Trump is a dire threat to journalism itself, and that we must take this seriously from the outset.
Last week, the four of us sat down to have some hard but necessary conversations about Truthout under a Trump presidency. How would we defend our publication from an avalanche of far right lawsuits that seek to bankrupt us? How would we keep our reporters safe if they need to cover outbreaks of political violence, or if they are targeted by authorities? How will we urgently produce the practical analysis, tools and movement coverage that you need right now — breaking through our normal routines to meet a terrifying moment in ways that best serve you?
It will be a tough, scary four years to produce social justice-driven journalism. We need to deliver news, strategy, liberatory ideas, tools and movement-sparking solutions with a force that we never have had to before. And at the same time, we desperately need to protect our ability to do so.
We know this is such a painful moment and donations may understandably be the last thing on your mind. But we must ask for your support, which is needed in a new and urgent way.
We promise we will kick into an even higher gear to give you truthful news that cuts against the disinformation and vitriol and hate and violence. We promise to publish analyses that will serve the needs of the movements we all rely on to survive the next four years, and even build for the future. We promise to be responsive, to recognize you as members of our community with a vital stake and voice in this work.
Please dig deep if you can, but a donation of any amount will be a truly meaningful and tangible action in this cataclysmic historical moment. We are presently looking for 98 new monthly donors before midnight tonight.
We’re with you. Let’s do all we can to move forward together.
With love, rage, and solidarity,
Maya, Negin, Saima, and Ziggy