The state's unemployment-compensation fund is expected to spit out its last few dollars today or Monday, triggering a federal bailout to ensure that weekly benefits to jobless Ohioans continue.
Skyrocketing job losses and years of collecting less in unemployment taxes than the fund paid out in benefits are to blame, state officials said.
"There are just a crushing number of claims," said Bob Welsh, deputy director of Ohio's unemployment-compensation system.
The state paid claims to 248,000 jobless workers in the last week of December, a 63 percent increase from the same week a year earlier.
But borrowing from the feds can come with a hefty price tag. The state projects that if changes are not made to Ohio's unemployment-compensation system, the fund's deficit will grow to nearly $3.3 billion by 2016, and after nine years of borrowing, the state will owe $1 billion in interest.
http://www.dispatchpolitics.com/live/content/local_news/stories/2009/01/09/copy/comp_fund.ART_ART_01-09-09_A1_Q0CG35P.html?adsec=politics&sid=101
No comments:
Post a Comment