Posted on 11/02/2012 3:01:34 PM PDT by 2ndDivisionVet
The local economy, already bruised by a persistently high jobless rate, could take another hit as the new year begins, regardless of who is elected president.
That's because all federal extended unemployment benefits will expire Dec. 29 unless Congress acts to extend them again.
If the expiration occurs, North Carolinians would receive just up to 26 weeks of regular state benefits if they qualify for unemployment benefits, rather than what had been up to 99 weeks of state and federal benefits.
Which means anyone whose job was terminated or ended after June 30 will not get any more federal unemployment benefits.
Bobbi Wessling, manager of the Winston-Salem office of the N.C. Division of Employment Security, said her office has been informing jobless-benefit recipients of the pending expiration.
"We're continuously reminding them on the phone and when they come to see us," Wessling said. "They are concerned, of course, because for many of them the benefits are their only source of income."
North Carolina was one of 22 states whose unemployed recipients could receive up to the 99 weeks, in part because its unemployment rate stayed above 8 percent for several years...
(Excerpt) Read more at hispanicbusiness.com ...
How’s THAT for a Christmas present?
Now that there will be millions of disaster UI claims this ought to really mess up the budget....except for those who blew all 99 weeks already...
Having just lost my 30 year job recently, I don’t qualify for extended benefits. Hopefully I will find a job long before the state’s 26 weeks of unemployment benefits expire.
I was laid off here in NC in September, I already knew they were ending. And as an added plus for me, since I got a bonus paid in the first quarter of 2011, the way they calculate how much you can qualify for here in this state means that I can only get 14 weeks of unemployment insurance, yeah me....
People tend to look more earnestly for work (any kind of work) if they are close to losing their unemployment. It has only been during this silly O administration that the number of weeks was expanded. For the longest time 26 weeks was the standard. Extending that out to almost two years had many ( all too many) saying I am not going to look for work because I can get by on unemployment for now and I don’t want to take a lower paying job. It used to be that people out of work were willing to take a job any job so they could get by. That is no longer the case for all too many
How do people do that?
I have been on UN-employment for exactly 1 week in my 57 plus years, it didn’t / wasn’t worth the effort ... I could mow lawns, get sales jobs and basically my time was better served out in the field making money while looking for a job and not sitting in some Office waiting for someone to “Help” me ...
The worst part of that time in my life was that I had THREE kids in Braces ... (I think I put that Orthodontist’s kid through at least 3 years of College)
Back in those days I hated Mac n’Cheese, now I love the stuff ... I still hate Ramen Noodles though (that crap is only to be consumed minutes (maybe seconds) before starving to death)
OK “Rant Off”
TT
” It used to be that people out of work were willing to take a job any job so they could get by. That is no longer the case for all too many”
I still see it until now. My buds have companies that get a few very good resumes and when they call in these people for interviews or start work, they don’t show up. It’s unbelievable how these jobless are still picky.
Jan 2013 UE rate will probably drop to 5%
You are right in general that people have become picky but this economy does not even offer “any job”.
Well, it offers “any job” but there are 40+ applicants for even the jobs that would normally be easy to get: ie gathering carts in the Walmart Parking Lot, gasoline attendent at Sam’s Club, bagging groceries at the grocery store, overnight stocking in department stores - VERY difficult to get in this Obama economy.
Problem is - many seekers for one position. If you’re over 40 GOOD LUCK.
We’re living in very difficult times where the jobs that nobody wants now has 40+ applicants.
If the expiration occurs, North Carolinians would receive just up to 26 weeks of regular state benefits if they qualify for unemployment benefits, rather than what had been up to 99 weeks of state and federal benefits."
Oh, the irony.
States were only authorized to offer EB if their Un% exceeded Fed Un%. By jiggering the Fed Un% rate, Bobo put about half of the 23 states that -- based on that rule -- had to stop offering EB earlier this year, back into play! ... should Congress reauthorize EB.
I’m on the hiring committee for a part time no benefits job (20-28 hours a week) with the possibility of having to drive to several different locations within our system. The job pays 10-12 bucks an hour and you don’t get reimbursed for mileage if you have to drive to one of the other locations. We had 221 applications, at least a dozen had masters degrees, and one was a recent Harvard grad. It’s the Obamaconomy.
The greeter at the local Walmart here has a Masters Degree.
This hurts everybody
When all those people stop getting UE checks the UE numbers have to drop.
I learned early on that it is always easier to get a job when I have a job....
A friend had a cab driver with a Ph D in Medieval Russian Literature... Oh, wait, that was when the economy was good.
There are other factors too. My situation, until I finally hooked up with an old friend who was in a position to have me do some contract work for his company, was not unusual:
First came the across the board salary cuts from the company I'd worked for for almost 20 years. My (about average) take home pay (after health insurance, SS, taxes, etc.) dropped almost 50%. This was typical, but almost everyone stayed on, due to lack of other decent openings, loyalty to the company, or other reasons. There were more rounds of layoffs. Then came the final round of layoffs (all employees but two, and the owner, of a company employing 300+ in it's prime, had been laid off.) The manufacturing industry we were in had contracted to almost zero, in the US, now it was the summer of 2008, and I was not one of the "two". I went on unemployment, and my family lived on that, while I looked for employment and tried to refire my hobby / business of the past into a real business, also offering consulting services. No one "bit". (As with most other business "starts", the rest of the business was of course a big money loser for some time. And this was toward the end of 2008.) Employment at a much lower salary is very dicey, because if you take a lower paying job, and then lose that, your unemployment benefits go down to a level where one's financial survival is questionable at best. The other problem is that now one has a "blot" on one's resume, and just about no one is hiring anyone but "perfect" candidates. It is also true that these days, most employers figure the gov't is responsible for providing ideally trained employees.
Eventually, my friend came through, and my work for them is really only practical for them because I had not had to sell off my personal lab gear and so on, and was able to stay "current" in my field. So, this 55+ year old is back to being a real contributor to society -- a lot more than if I'd ended up in some "menial job", barely surviving.
Now, all that said, I have also seen people game the system. So, I don't know what the perfect solution is, other than a much better jobs market!
Perhaps it is because of the field that I am in and the fact that I have worked for many a start up...I have gone through all of that....I have always found it is not what I know (though that helps) but who I know. My network has come through over the years.
I am not unsympathetic to your plight. Part of what has kept job formation and growth down over the last four years has been TOO MUCH government intervention. They bailed out auto companies instead of letting them go through the natural course of bankruptcy. The idea of too big to fail became the mantra (what nonsense in a supposedly free market system). And then came the more and more government hand outs. The government gave out pittances rather than letting the market correct itself. Disaster all around. The people have suffered because the politicians were all too willing to look like they were good guys by throwing money at the problem. All this did was make the problem worse.
When my grandparents went through both the dust bowl and the great depression they had little. They found a way to get by...for themselves and their children. Somewhere along the line Americans have become too willing to let big government be the answer instead of seeing it as the problem.
Anyway my comments were not directed at one individuals because the stories out there can and do make me weep. I just know that government ‘help’ rarely is.
I was unemployed/under employed for a couple of years...but kept fit working the garden and splitting logs for the wood stove.
Got my CDL licence after turning 70 and am now full time long haul truck driving around the US.
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