Emergency unemployment insurance continues
EUC
claimants should certify for benefits
IDES still
faces budget cuts
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[January 05, 2013]
CHICAGO -- The federal Emergency
Unemployment Compensation insurance program will continue through
December 2013, the Illinois Department of Employment Security said
Wednesday.
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Congress this week extended the Emergency Unemployment Compensation program as
part of the ongoing fiscal cliff negotiations. Illinois workers collecting EUC
should continue to certify for benefits. Congress did not add new weeks to the
federal unemployment insurance program. Therefore, individuals who exhausted EUC
are not eligible for additional unemployment insurance benefits.
Extending the EUC program will support a gradually improving economy. Every
$1 in unemployment insurance generates $1.63 in economic activity because the
dollars are quickly spent at neighborhood businesses.
Had Congress not reauthorized the program, 90,000 Illinois claimants would
have received their last EUC payment within the next two weeks. Additionally,
2,800 individuals each week would have completed the state's regular program of
unemployment insurance and not had access to the federal EUC.
Extending EUC will not alleviate the budget pressures at IDES. The Illinois
department receives operational funding entirely from the federal government.
Funding levels are tied to the number of people collecting unemployment
insurance. Fewer people collecting state unemployment insurance means an $11
million annual cut. These cuts come at a time when the numbers of claims remain
38 percent higher than prior to the recession.
The fiscal cliff negotiations did not resolve cuts to budgets such as the
IDES budget. Rather, Congress delayed by two months the date the automatic cuts
in what is called the sequester take effect. Therefore, IDES still stands to
lose an additional $17 million in operating funds.
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To begin to address these budget challenges, IDES already has
stopped scheduling 216 intermittent employees, consolidated eight
offices and vacated 10 outpost locations shared with partners. The
federal cuts might necessitate further service reductions, including
additional office consolidations.
Illinois businesses provide the state's 25-week regular
unemployment program for claims initiated in 2012. The federal EUC,
divided into Tiers I, II, III and IV, provides the next 53 weeks of
unemployment insurance. The federally funded Extended Benefits
program, or EB, provided the final 20 weeks. It expired in May 2012.
[Text from
Illinois
Department of Employment Security
file received from
the
Illinois Office of
Communication and Information]
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