Feds terminate extra $ 300 jobless benefit
The federal Lost Wages Assistance program, which provided an additional $ 300 per week to individuals who are unemployed because of COVID- 19, has ended before the first payments in Pennsylvania were distributed.
The state Department of Labor and Industry announced Thursday that the Federal Emergency Management Agency, which is administering the funds, told state officials the LWA program ended Saturday.
In Pennsylvania, that was one day before individuals were able to start applying to receive the supplemental jobless benefits.
The state has already received about $ 2.4 billion in funding to finance the program and will continue to make payments until that money runs out, said Jerry Olekisak, secretary of the state Department of Labor and Industry, on Thursday.
“I urge anyone who is partially or fully unemployed because of COVID- 19 and hasn’t yet applied for LWA benefits to do so right away,” Mr. Oleksiak said in a statement.
Individuals in Pennsylvania
were able to start applying for the additional benefits Sunday and are expected to start receiving the money as early as this coming Monday.
The extra $ 300 would be tacked on retroactively for claims filed for the weeks between Aug. 1 and Sunday.
The number of Americans applying for unemployment benefits was unchanged last week at 884,000, a sign that layoffs remain stuck at a historically high level six months after the viral pandemic flattened the economy.
The latest figures released by the Labor Department on Thursday coincide with other recent evidence that the job market’s improvement may be weakening after solid gains through spring and most of summer. The number of people seeking jobless aid each week still far exceeds the number who did so in any week on record before this year.
Hiring nationally has slowed since June, and a rising number of laid- off workers say they regard their job loss as permanent. The number of people who are continuing to receive state unemployment benefits rose last week to 13.4 million, evidence that employers aren’t hiring enough to offset layoffs. Job postings have leveled off in the past month, according to the employment website Indeed.
“The claims data were disappointing,” said Rubeela Farooqi, chief U. S. economist at High Frequency Economics. “It is especially concerning that the pace of layoffs has not slowed more materially even though the economy has reopened more fully and more and more businesses have come back online.”
Hiring will likely remain restrained as long as Americans are unable or reluctant to resume their normal habits of shopping, traveling, dining out and engaging in other commerce. The rate of reported infections has dropped over the past several weeks but remains well above where it was during the spring. Most analysts say the economy won’t likely be able to sustain a recovery until a vaccine is widely available.
President Donald Trump had planned to set aside $ 44 billion in previously approved federal disaster aid to help states maintain the supplemental unemployment compensation.
A spokesperson for the Federal Emergency Management Agency said Thursday that the agency is providing money to cover six weeks for participating states, from the start of August through the end of this week, with no extension in sight.
Nearly all states have applied for the $ 300- a- week benefit. But only 17, including Pennsylvania, have managed to upgrade their computer systems to actually distribute the payments.
Mr. Trump’s jobless aid program was created by an executive order last month after a more generous version that had been adopted by Congress in the spring expired and Mr. Trump and Congress failed to reach agreement on a new aid package.
Through July, people out of work amid the pandemic were receiving $ 600 a week in federal aid on top of their state unemployment benefits. For many recipients, the federal check exceeded their state benefits and kept them afloat as the economy crumbled. But Republicans in Congress opposed the $ 600, arguing that it was so high as to discourage many of the unemployed from looking for a job.
On Thursday, Senate Democrats blocked legislation that would have extended the extra $ 300 payment and provided more money for schools. The Democrats favored restoring the full $ 600- a- week jobless benefit as well as setting aside more money for states, localities and small businesses.
Mr. Oleksiak has said several times that his department and the Wolf administration would rather the federal government extend the $ 600 weekly supplement. The new $ 300- a- week program adds more limits on who is eligible for the funds and puts extra strain on state officials to set up and maintain a new system to distribute the money.
“The convoluted program, which is a Band- Aid rather than an actual solution, is responsible for delaying getting this supplemental funding to people who need it now to pay bills and feed their families,” Mr. Oleksiak said in August. “Hardworking Pennsylvanians need more than a temporary program that is forcing us to recreate the wheel.”
In order to qualify for the additional $ 300, individuals must be unemployed because of COVID19 and must receive at least $ 100 a week through state programs set up to provide economic relief.
To apply, individuals must self- certify one time that they are fully or partially unemployed because of COVID- 19 on the unemployment center website.
Individuals receiving benefits through the Pandemic Unemployment Assistance program — the federal system set up to expand unemployment benefits to people who were not previously eligible for such benefits — do not need to apply.
Individuals seeking to receive benefits through any program should apply as soon as possible, state officials said.
Nationally, the government last week reported that the nation gained 1.4 million jobs in August, down from 1.7 million in July. It was the lowest monthly gain since hiring resumed in May. The unemployment rate sank from 10.2% to 8.4%, a drop that economists said mainly reflected businesses recalling workers who had been temporarily laid off rather than hiring new employees.