On Extending Unemployment Compensation

I am opposed to the 13 month extension of unemployment benefits that has just been passed by Congress. Am I a Grinch? I don’t think so. Am I heartless? People who know me know I am very generous. What I am against are benefits that last so long that people adapt to living on the dole or that can easily be defrauded.


Let me give you an example:

In late 2008, I terminated two employees for cause; one for being legally drunk on the job and another for falsifying time records. Both were violations of printed company policy. The State ruled that I could legally fire them, but that their actions were not serious enough to deny them unemployment benefits. Nearly two years later, they are both still collecting unemployment although they are doing work in competition with me while collecting unemployment. Now that their benefits are close to running out, I was told by a competitor that one of them has just applied for a job. What they are doing is defrauding the system, but the state has cut back on the number of investigators and is not able to pursue this issue.

Those of you who are business owners; when was the last time you had someone ask you to sign their sheet or card showing they applied for a job? It has been several years for me. How does the Employment Security Commission know if someone receiving Unemployment Compensation is actively seeking work or is working on the side and not reporting it?

Also, continuing benefits that exceed minimum wage, what incentive is it to accept a lower paying job? A recent article in the paper said that if you don’t have a job a lot of businesses won’t hire you; they are afraid you could be just looking for a temporary job to re-set your unemployment.

If we are going to continue these generous benefits, we need to tie them to some controls or follow up to prevent fraud or re-training to work in a field that is hiring. Payouts without strings have got to stop.