> If I'm laid off, I'll first look at my savings and hit the job market before I consider driving right into unemployment.
This is a great case of “the world doesn’t revolve around you.”
1. Most states only give you a few weeks to apply.
2. You already “pay” for your unemployment several times over during your career through unemployment insurance. Your employer pays this, but they could have paid you more if they didn’t have to.
3. It’s income. You still pay taxes on it. It’s not free money out of nowhere.
Use the tiny social net that you have instead of waiting too late and out of money and having to rely on family or friends.
1. Which is a problem if you're immediately unemployed. If you're instead working part time at a rate greater than unemployment and still retaining healthcare benefits, you don't have to worry about unemployment (depending on what sort of healthcare policies the employer stipulates). This can be a discussion employers have with employers: allowing people to have choices between working part time, taking a temporary pay cut (depending on the situation--aceoss the board including upper management), or being laid off.
2. That's pretty much verifiably false. That's fundamentally trickle down economics which everyone knows simply doesn't work. Employers could take that money and increase your compensation. Historically, that hasn't happened. Any breaks given on those expenses temporarily go to an employee then disappear quickly after because there's nothing the business gains by shifting that to labor expenses. The most recent example to look at is the 2017 'Tax Cuts and Jobs Act' which translated to almost no increase in labor rates aside from initial PR compensation packages that people received, forgot about, and continued on with stagnant compensation rates.
3. I never said it's free money, I pointed out in the first paragraph it's not free money. Employees pay a large portion of unemployment as taxes, as I said. Businesses also contribute to that in taxes but the lionshare comes from labor taxes.
"2. You already “pay” for your unemployment several times over during your career through unemployment insurance. Your employer pays this, but they could have paid you more if they didn’t have to."
If you assume a 1.55% tax rate for UI, you will contribute about a week of unemployment per year of work (at least in S.C.) at 70k taxable income after a modest administrative overhead of 60%.
If you manage to work from 25 to 65 at an average of $70k per year, that’s almost a year worth of unemployment.
OK going with your assumptions, I wonder what % of people collecting unemployment benefits have worked for 40 years at an average of $70k/yr? I am not aware of a single individual, but maybe just don't know the right people.
It should scale out at about 1 week per year of work, no matter how much you make. $70k per year is how much you need to max out unemployment in S.C., where I used to live. If you make less than that, you'll have less per week, if you make more than that, you're pretty royally screwed.
1. Are unemployment employment benefits only extended to those who have already themselves paid a certain amount in UI taxes AND that amount is the extent of the benefits available to them?
2. If the answer above is no - do you know what % of end up receiving more money in unemployment benefits than they have 'pre-paid' or will 'reimburse' thus a net cost to the system over the course of their living/working lives?
3. What happens to the unemployment taxes paid by people who choose not/never to file for unemployment benefits, even when unemployed? Do those individuals ever get their money back?
4. This line of questioning leads me to wonder why in the US is UI/UB not just directly linked to each individual?
1. Sort-of-but-not-really. Usually, you have to work a certain number of months or weeks at the place you get laid off, before you are eligible. However, there's not a "lifetime minimum." If you get fired for doing something "bad" (at-fault) then you may not be eligible at all.
2. Usually, there's a cap for how long you can be on unemployment. You can't be on it forever. You also have to provide proof that you're looking for a job. Some states require signatures from those companies, some just require a list of companies you've applied to and they do their own random validation.
3. Companies pay the unemployment insurance tax on your behalf, and if you're unemployed and don't file, you don't get to use your benefits.
This is a great case of “the world doesn’t revolve around you.”
1. Most states only give you a few weeks to apply.
2. You already “pay” for your unemployment several times over during your career through unemployment insurance. Your employer pays this, but they could have paid you more if they didn’t have to.
3. It’s income. You still pay taxes on it. It’s not free money out of nowhere.
Use the tiny social net that you have instead of waiting too late and out of money and having to rely on family or friends.