During the partial shutdown, when federal officials promised that employees
would receive wages for the days that they did not work, IDES offered the
reminder that individuals who also sought unemployment insurance benefits for
the same period would be required to repay the benefits. Preliminary data show
that of the 2,937 federal workers who applied for unemployment insurance, 577
took the next step to be paid a total of $231,174. These individuals will be
sent notices that the money must be repaid to IDES. If it is not, IDES can take
steps to recover those dollars, including garnishing tax refunds.
"The federal shutdown needlessly scared scores of workers and robbed our
economy of $24 billion in growth," said IDES Director Jay Rowell. "Another
consequence was that thousands of federal workers turned to unemployment
insurance because they did not know how long they would be out of work. Now that
federal employees are being repaid, they need to pay back the unemployment
insurance benefits they received. I fully expect that they will."
Recovering the dollars that were paid is part of IDES' standard integrity
measures that help place downward pressure on the payroll taxes businesses pay
to fund unemployment insurance benefits. In this case, that employer is the
federal government, and the money it uses comes from our tax dollars.
[to top of second column] |
It is important to note that more than 2,937 federal workers were
sent home as a result of the partial shutdown. This number reflects
only those individuals whose applications for unemployment insurance
benefits have been processed. IDES does not know the exact number of
furloughed employees.
IDES takes seriously its responsibility to fight waste, fraud and
abuse. As such, it has launched several integrity initiatives to
safeguard the unemployment insurance program from unscrupulous
employers and employees. In the past two years, IDES has garnished
tax returns to recover more than $85 million in fraudulent payments
and has used enhanced data integration to stop more than $160
million in fraudulent payments before they could be made. IDES also
has focused on businesses that have attempted to defraud the program
and has increased tax collections by 27 percent in 2012.
[Text from
Illinois Department of
Employment Security
file received from the
Illinois Office of Communication and Information] |