Unemployment Insurance Maximum Duration Dropping To 79 Weeks

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from HuffPost:



Nearly 30,000 people enduring long-term joblessness in Michigan are set to lose their unemployment insurance as a federal program that provides the final 20 weeks of benefits expires there.

The lapse of the Extended Benefits program in Michigan is a reminder that, even though Congress fully reauthorized federal unemployment insurance for two months in December, lawmakers sneakily shortened the duration of benefits. Legislators did not announce benefits would be changed, but according to its complex eligibility formula, Extended Benefits will expire over the course of the year in the rest of the 32 states where the program is in effect.

"This is the first wave of tens of thousands of laid-off workers losing their unemployment insurance unless the program is extended in Washington these next weeks in a sound and sensitive manner," Rep. Sander Levin (D-Mich.) said in a statement on Saturday. "If the federal extended benefit program is not fixed in the conference committee, close to 30 states will follow Michigan and lose access to this program in the first six months of 2012."

States are eligible for Extended Benefits if their jobless rates are high and rising compared with a corresponding period over the previous three years. Since Michigan's rate is steadily declining -- it fell from 11.1 percent at the end of 2010 to 9.3 percent in December -- the state is "triggering off" the program. But even if the rate hadn't fallen at all, unless it's at least 10 percent higher than it was three years ago, the state would still lose Extended Benefits. Maine, where the jobless rate is 7 percent, will also trigger off the program this month. ...................(more)

The complete piece is at: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/02/06/unemployment-insurance-jobless-benefits_n_1257731.html

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