A few weeks ago there were media reports about legislators circulating a bill to allow employees who quit or are discharged for refusing a vaccine to qualify for unemployment benefits.
Well, they actually did it. Meet SB 547. The bill creates a host of exemptions for those workers who refuse vaccines and lose their jobs as a result to qualify for unemployment benefits. The legislators even included a provision automatically to waive charges to employer accounts for unemployment benefits paid out to those refusing a vaccine, something the legislators failed to do in 2020 for pandemic-related job losses.
Think of all the other issues that have been ignored by the state legislature during the past year and half that have made unemployment more difficult for Wisconsin workers.
having to quit a job for lack of childcare, like when schools close (instead, workers who lose jobs because of childcare need to argue they quit for good cause because of the illegal actions of the employer, that the employer has violated a basic term and condition of employment established for the job, or give up on claiming regular unemployment benefits and shift to PUA benefits, which end this week),
waiving requirements that employees who are quarantined or sick with Covid-19 symptoms must still be able and available for work and must still search for jobs (these requirements were part of the job search waiver emergency rule that the legislature went out of its way to nix),
granting an automatic experience rating waiver for all job losses during the pandemic (as happened in nearly all other states) and which has been so messed up in Wisconsin that few employers even know about it, and
forcing the state unemployment agency to adopt one of the quarterly benefit waiver provisions to ease the quarterly benefit year eligibility re-calculation problem that puts a halt to benefit payments each quarter
There are so many, many issues that could and need to be addressed. Unemployment benefits for those refusing a vaccine is NOT one of them.
Finally, there is a claim-filing snafu on the portal today. Claimants are being told that they have already filed their weekly certification for PUA benefits for the week ending 9/4/2021 on Sept. 3rd.
Normally, the laws of time are that future events need to occur in the future, not in the past. But, for some unknown reason, the claim portal is telling PUA claimants that they have already filed their weekly certification for a week not yet over — the last week PUA benefits are available.
The support for D21-01 through D21-08 is disappointing, as basic questions remain unanswered about why these proposed changes are needed, including:
Why are penalties against employers increasing so much in the last four years that the separate fund proposed in D21-01 is now needed?
Why is the Department in D21-06 re-writing unemployment law to its benefit when it loses key court cases?
Why the Department in D21-06 is allowing administrative law judges to ignore Commission precedent and unemployment law and regulations without any consequences?
How will an option to be a fiscal agent in D21-08 actually fix the confusing mess of excluded employment and unemployment taxes that currently exists when a family member cares for another?
In financial news, the unemployment trust fund has $977.5 million as of August 7th.
The Department introduced to council members SB485/AB487, a bill that would exclude uber and lyft drivers from regular unemployment benefits. Strangely, the Department has yet to introduce AB394, a bill that would revamp the over-payment waiver standard to add an equity and good conscience standard to whether an over-payment is affordable or not.
Indeed, there is some interesting data and issues with this latter bill. The Department’s fiscal estimate for AB394 indicates that in the 2018 and 2019 calendar years combined there were only around 350 no-fault over-payments (lack of fault is a precondition for an equity and good conscience waiver). Given that there were 41,197 non-fraud over-payment decisions in 2019 and 44,634 non-fraud over-payment decisions in 2018 (for a combined total of 85,831 non-fraud over-payment decisions, seethe 2020 Fraud Report at 9), this number of around 350 is just unbelievable. Less than 0.5% (1 out of every 200 who allegedly made a non-fraudulent mistake) of these cases are without claimant fault?
This conclusion makes even less sense when comparing the number of non-fraud decisions in these years relative to the number of initial claims filed and the number of claimants actually paid unemployment benefits in these years.
That is, in 2018 and 2019 non-fraud mistakes are around one out of every seven initial claims and one out of every three paid claims. If non-fraudulent mistakes are truly this high (and in years when claim-filing was at an all-time low), then the Department’s guidance to claimants and the claim-filing process are themselves completely broken and inadequate. Claimants are making claim-filing mistakes because the Department is completely inadequate in assisting claimants when they are filing unemployment claims.
But, since the pandemic started there have been no questions or discussion over the claim-filing process at an Advisory Council meeting.
Labor’s proposed increase in the weekly benefit rate attracted a great deal of attention from the management side. The Department presented three different scenarios of what the proposed increase would mean, depending on low, medium, and high unemployment — based on the number of weeks of unemployment paid per a typical claim. The management reps, however, want to know an additional variable — what changes in the unemployment rate itself would mean under this proposed weekly benefit rate. The staffer for the Department tried to explain that the three scenarios necessarily implicated a change in unemployment rates (more unemployment claims is correlated with longer periods of unemployment), but the management reps were insistent on seeing numbers directly rated to unemployment rates.
The problem with management representatives’ demand for unemployment rates is that those rates are no longer correlated with the number of unemployment claims filed or paid in Wisconsin. In 2007, the unemployment rate in Wisconsin was 4.8%, but 638,548 initial claims were filed that year and 332,982 of those initial claims (52.15%) were paid.
In 2019, the unemployment rate in Wisconsin was down to 3.3%, roughly 68% of the unemployment rate from 2007. Yet, initial claims in 2019 were down even further to 287,043, and paid claimants were down still more to 129,888. Those 2019 numbers are 45% and 39% of comparable 2007 numbers. In other words, claim-filing has declined to such an extent that it no longer has an historical connection to unemployment rates.
One tidbit in the Department’s research response that went without comment was the disclosure that 2,167 claimants in a typical year win approval of benefits under the 30-day quit to try a new job provision. Since 130,710 claimants were paid unemployment benefits in 2018, this 2,167 figure means that roughly 1 out of every 100 claimants received their unemployment benefits because of this quit exception.
Note: In its research response, the Department reports that 3,425 claimants received unemployment benefits in 2019 under the 30-day quit provision, but that this number was higher than expected because the number of claims being filed increased that year. The number of initial claims in 2019 was up slightly to 287,043 from 279,912 in 2018, hardly a major increase. Moreover, the claimants who were paid benefits in 2019 was actually down in 2019, at 129,888, from 130,710 in 2018. So, it appears that the 30-day quit exception is actually more significant in allowing claimants to receive unemployment benefits that what the Department is reporting.
The other research response that drew ire from management representatives was that the Department indicated that the ability of temp companies to immediately challenge claimant eligibility about missed interviews, declined job offers, and job search contacts was problematic during the initial modernization process. The Department indicated that these management proposals could eventually be implemented and indeed voiced support for them, but that the initial modernization effort could not include them because the modernization request for proposals had already been written and because claimant confidentiality issues would need to be addressed to allow employers to respond in the desired ways. Management reps, however, were unhappy with even this kind of delay. They want to object to claimant eligibility immediately.
At the 15 July 2021 council meeting, labor and management representatives exchanged their own proposals. Labor representatives in general attempt to make unemployment somewhat financially viable in Wisconsin. Management representatives build on prior “reforms” to make unemployment even more difficult and rare. Here is a rundown of those proposals.
1.Fix the funding for the unemployment trust fund by changing how tax schedules are applied. Currently, the tax schedule to be applied to employers is based on the amount of money in the trust fund (which was $919.2 million as of 10 July 2021). This labor proposal would change the criteria to using an unemployment trust fund health number called an Average High Cost Multiple or AHCM.
Schedule A = When UI Trust Fund is below .5 AHCM
Schedule B = When UI Trust Fund is between .5 – 1.0 AHCM
Schedule C = When UI Trust Fund is between 1.0 – 1.25 AHCM
Schedule D = When UI Trust Fund is above 1.25 AHCM
Prior to the pandemic, when the trust fund had nearly $1.7 billion, the average high cost multiple was just under 1. In April 2021, when the trust fund still had slightly over $1 billion, the multiple was around 0.5.
2021 Wis. Act 59 is unnecessarily keeping unemployment tax rates at Schedule D for 2021 and 2022, and this labor proposal would also keep the tax rates at Schedule D. Per Wis. Stat. § 108.18(3m), tax schedules are based on the following trust fund balances (as of June 30th of the preceding calendar year):
Schedule A: less than $300 million
Schedule B: less than $900 million
Schedule C: less than $1.2 billion
Schedule D: more than $1.2 billion
In general, the actual tax rates for Wisconsin employers continued to fall in 2021 from 2020 tax rates because of fewer claims being paid to employees of Wisconsin employers. With fewer claims being paid, employers’ account balances are growing. As a result, employers have been moving to lower tax brackets within Schedule D.
2.Gradually Increase the maximum weekly benefit rate for unemployment benefits to $450 per week.
This proposed change would not take effect for another two years, however.
Current weekly maximum UI benefit $370
2023 Benefit Year $20 increase $390
2024 Benefit Year $20 increase $410
2025 Benefit Year $20 increase $430
2026 Benefit Year $20 increase $450
This increase is half of what the Department proposes in D21-22 and needs to include a repeal of the $500 or more earnings prohibition to be effective, which the Department also proposed in D21-21. For further explanation, see the examination of these Department proposals here. As already noted, Wisconsin’s weekly benefit rate is the second lowest in the mid-west:
State Max. WBR Max. w/ dependents
IL $484 $667
IN $390 $390
IA $481 $591
MI $362 $362
MN $740 $740
OH $480 $647
WI $370 $370
3.Eliminate the one-week waiting period, which is also included in Department proposal D21-19 and previously discussed here.
4.Expand worker mis-classification to all industries and make the penalties identical to claimant fraud. Here, labor representatives support adoption of Department proposal D21-26 and the recommendations of the governor’s misclassificaton task force. As noted in this discussion of the Department’s 2021 proposals, there are administrative and criminal penalties for claimant fraud as well as a different standard of proof for claimant fraud versus mis-classification by employers. It is not clear what the labor representatives are referring to with their proposal about identical penalties.
5.Request the Department to review tax schedules to assess the tax equity of those schedules.
What the labor representatives mean by tax equity is unknown.
1. When upgrading the Department’s mainframe, make sure employers have the ability to verify immediately any work search information that refers to that employer as well as the ability to report immediately any kind of work refusal, a missed job interview, or a decline of a job offer.
Employer’s currently have the ability to report all of this information as well as other kinds of information through the Department’s fraud reporting system.
Also, job search audits done pursuant to Wis. Stat. § 108.14(20) catch the interview and job offer information. This proposal would essentially give employers a direct avenue for challenging claimant eligibility when those claimants are NOT their former employees. For temp companies that have already seen their unemployment tax bills markedly reduced, this proposal secures an additional tool for cutting that tax bill even further. When claimants cannot collect unemployment benefits, then unemployment tax bills decline even further.
2.End the exclusion of union members from weekly job search requirements. Claimants who are working part-time, starting a new job in four weeks or less, will return to their current employer in the next eight weeks or so, AND union members who register on their union’s out-of-work list are exempt from doing four job searches per week. This proposal would require union hiring halls and union members who are on out-of-work lists with their unions to do four job searches per week through the union hiring hall.
This proposal does not make sense in light of how union hiring halls work. Hiring halls function based on the employers who contact them for available workers. But, that is not the point. Rather, this proposal is to draw media attention to this benefit union members enjoy and thereby create a further divide between them and most other workers in the state.
3.Redefine who an employee and independent contractor is for all fields of law to apply a single, common definition built around gig-work.
This proposal would completely upend almost all workplace law in Wisconsin, as one of the main changes being proposed is a person would be an independent contractor whenever a person signs a contract with an employer that states it is their intent to be independent contractor. In contrast to current law that specifies that such an arrangement can NOT be decided subjectively by the parties to the agreement, the proposal here is to give the parties the unilateral authority to create an independent contractor relationship on their own through a services contract.
Note: In practical terms, this authority is unilateral in the sense that individual employees have little to no bargaining power to set the terms and conditions of their employment.
Various “factors” are proposed to assess if a person is an independent contractor or not, but these factors are written so broadly and with so many loopholes that independent contractor status is all but assured. For instance, the services contract can still include a final schedule for delivery and a range of work hours as long as the time personally spent on providing services is left open. And, if costs for licenses, insurance, and certifications are borne by the person, then all is dandy with this gig-worker arrangement. In short, these criteria are not limitations but a road map for how to craft this independent contractor agreement.
Moreover, only four out of ten of these “factors” are needed for an independent contractor relationship to be established. So, an employer can make plenty is mistakes and still succeed on making their employees into gig-workers. A garbage truck driver, a machinist in a metal shop, and even a police officer could easily meet at least four of these factors and so be classified as independent contractors under this proposal.
Finally, this proposal also contains a poison pill that prevents any county or municipality from limiting this sweeping change to employment status in Wisconsin.
Regardless of any state law, however, this proposal if implemented would be a massive headache for employers, as federal wage and hour law, discrimination law, and collective bargaining law would still classify numerous “independent contractors” as employees for federal purposes. This proposal, in other words, is just plain silly and not serious at all.
4.End the 30-day quit-to-try a new job provision.
This proposal is another change that would greatly benefit temp companies by eliminating one of the main mechanisms employees may still qualify for unemployment benefits after trying out a job and quitting within the first 30 days.
By eliminating this provision, employees of temp companies would have to remain at every assignment regardless of fit, skill, wage, and working conditions until the assignment is ended by the employer to retain any hope of qualifying for unemployment benefits at some future date. Indentured servitude, in short, is making a comeback with this proposal.
5.Link the number of weeks of unemployment benefits available to the unemployment rate.
This proposal has been a bugaboo since 2010, as it essentially undermines the ability and scope of unemployment programs to respond in times of crisis. States that have implemented this linkage, like Florida and North Carolina, have been unemployment disaster zones, in part, because regular unemployment benefits were cut off prematurely during the pandemic.
6.Numerous misconduct and substantial fault modifications.
For misconduct, management representatives want to add additional disqualifications concerning employer or customer information while also removing a requirement that employees act intentionally for any alleged “violation.” Absenteeism and tardiness violations will also be both more stringent and applicable regardless of actual reason for the absence or tardiness. Finally, employees would be strictly liable for a violation of an employer’s social media policy, once the employees are made aware of that policy.
As previously noted, these changes would directly run afoul federal requirements and loose Wisconsin employers their federal unemployment tax (FUTA) credit.
Note: A state’s administration of unemployment is funded through the Federal Unemployment Tax Act on their payroll (the first $7000 paid to each employee) that employers pay, called FUTA. Should a state be found to be applying the loss of claimant wage credits for “unintentional” misconduct, Wisconsin employers would lose their FUTA tax credit and be subject to the full 6.0% unemployment tax rate rather than just 0.6%.
In regards to substantial fault, management reps want to undue the court decisions in Operton v. LIRC, 2017 WI 46, and Easterling v. LIRC, 2017 WI App 18, by redefining inadvertent error into harmless error that does not also violate an employer’s written policies. In other words, any error that does not qualify as misconduct would now almost assuredly qualify as substantial fault.
Wisconsin employers are having their unemployment tax rates slashed in 2017 because the fund from which unemployment benefits is reaching ever higher solvency metrics. The Walker administration is heralding this news here and here.
Understandably, there are two possible explanations for what is going on with the state’s unemployment fund. The state’s unemployment funds are positive because either job growth is booming or because fewer folks are claiming benefits despite NOT having jobs.
Is job growth booming in Wisconsin?
The July state jobs report reveals that job growth in Wisconsin continues to be anemic. This report indicates that, initially, in July 2016 5,000 private-sector jobs were added to Wisconsin payrolls. But, June 2016 numbers for private-sector job growth were revised downward, from 10,900 to 5,600. This loss of 5,300 jobs from the June report means that the initial number for July does not even get the state back to what was first reported for June 2016.
Neither does the quarterly data offer any better news. From March 2015 to March 2016, the quarterly data indicates that the state added 37,432 jobs during that time frame. But, this number is a few thousand less than what was reported for the March 2015 to March 2015 time frame in the July 2015 jobs report: 39,652 private-sector jobs.
So, without adding new jobs to the state’s economy, the decline in unemployment claims must be coming from fewer folks claiming unemployment benefits. In two bullet points, the July 2016 jobs report actually acknowledges this development.
Year 2016 initial UI claims are running at their lowest level since 1989.
Continuing unemployment claims in Wisconsin are running the lowest in at least the past 30 years.
But, the question remains: if jobs are not being created, why are claims now so low?
Why are unemployment claims so low?
Actual claims data is available from ETA 207, Non-monetary Determinations Activities Report. SeeDOLETA data downloads generally for UI data. The 207 data series has all determinations issued by a state compiled on a quarterly basis going back several decades until the most recently completed quarter, June 2016.
Here are some charts from that data for Wisconsin starting in the first quarter of 2007 through the second quarter of 2016.
This chart shows that most initial determinations issued by the Department lead to the denial of unemployment benefits. But, starting in the first quarter of 2014, the denial rate for initial determination jumped markedly. Prior to 2014, 59.90% of all initial determinations denied benefits to claimants. Since the start of 2014, 77.45% of all initial determinations issued by the Department have been to deny unemployment benefits. In other words, currently only one of four initial determinations being issued by the Department allows unemployment benefits, and three out of four initial determinations deny unemployment benefits in some way.
Keep in mind that these numbers are based on the initial determinations issued by the Department in regards to a new unemployment claim. In most states, these determinations would consist almost entirely of separation determinations — whether claimants are disqualified because their discharge was their fault in some way or they lacked good cause for quitting their jobs. In Wisconsin, these separation decisions are only a part of what the Department decides. And, increasingly separation decisions are becoming a smaller and smaller part of what the Department does in disqualifying claimants.
Here, initial determination concerning separation issues (i.e., quits and discharges) were around 60% of all initial determinations until 2009, when they declined and hovered around 50% of all initial determinations until the first quarter of 2014. At that point, the percentage of separation initial determinations being issued by the Department plummeted to 40% of all initial determinations. In the last two quarters of 2015, the number of separation initial determinations fell again to under 30% of all initial determinations. So at present, less than 30% of the initial determinations being issued by the Department concern separation issues related to a discharge or a quit. And, since most of these other determinations (and probably all of them given the analysis below) are denying unemployment benefits, many of these probably include some kind of concealment allegation, given the Department’s push to allege concealment against claimants.
In regards to denying claimants unemployment benefits, the Department consistently denied about 26% of all claimants who were discharged from their jobs until the first quarter of 2014.
From the first quarter of 2014 until the latest, however, the number of discharge cases being denied jumped to 38.47% of all discharge determinations. This increase nearly doubled the number of denials from before 2014 — a stunning and remarkable jump in the number of claims being denied.
The magnitude of this jump is seen when it is compared the number of quit denials over this same time frame.
Here, a slight increase in denials occurs in the first quarter of 2014. But, this increase is part of a general increase in denial rates that appears to have started in the second half of 2010. So, while denial rates for those quitting their jobs are high and gradually increasing, there is no sudden or striking shift in denial rates in quit cases at any one point in time.
Now, consider that in the last two years only about 30% of all initial determinations concern separation issues and that only 1 out of 4 initial determinations is allowing unemployment benefits at all. In this light, it appears that the only initial determinations right now allowing benefits are the discharge and quit separation determinations that are NOT denying benefits. Everything else the Department is doing is to deny unemployment benefits to claimants.
What these numbers reveal is that most folks applying for unemployment benefits are being denied those benefits, that essentially the only folks qualifying for unemployment benefits are those laid off from their jobs by their employers, and that numerous denials of unemployment benefits have nothing to do with separation issues. These non-separation initial determinations most likely are part of the Department’s program integrity efforts and most likely lead to charges of unemployment concealment, especially under the Department’s new strict liability standard for concealment.
So, unemployment claims and benefits are at record lows in the state because the state is making it difficult to impossible for claimants to receive benefits and charging the few that collect unemployment benefits with unemployment concealment. Essentially, employers are paying unemployment taxes for a benefit almost no one is using. Pretty soon, folks will start calling for eliminating the unemployment system entirely, as who wants to pay a tax that does nothing.
UPDATE (14 Sept. 2016): Fixed links so that a click on a chart brings up a full-sized version.
A previous post noted that unemployment taxes for employers are going down because the reserve fund’s cash balance is currently and expected to remain more than $500 million.
This success is remarkable, especially since it did not come about because employers’ taxes have been raised substantially. To be sure, the higher unemployment during the Great Recession led to the highest tax schedule — Schedule A — being implemented. And, for three years, 2011 to 2013, the FUTA tax credit available to employers was reduced.
But, recall the UI debt hole Wisconsin was in during the Great Recession. In March 2011, Wisconsin owed just over $1.6 billion because of borrowing to cover unemployment benefits being paid out. Only eleven other states ever owed more during this recession.
One point six billion dollars is a big hole to climb out of. As noted in a recent GAO report, some states reduced the number of weeks claimants were eligible for benefits as a way to fix their UI debt problems. In short, rather than making employers pay more, these states limited the ability of claimants to collect benefits in the first place. With less benefits being paid out, the taxes employers paid went further.
Other than the introduction of a waiting week before unemployment benefits begin being paid out, Wisconsin did not shorten the total weeks of unemployment eligibility. But, Wisconsin did other things on the benefit side of the equation that have starkly reduced the amount of benefits being paid out to claimants.
As noted previously, Wisconsin has been exceptionally aggressive on charging claimants with concealment and is proposing both increased penalties and stricter compliance standards to be applied to claimants that would effectively charge them with fraud when making honest mistakes on their claims. As the Department’s own fraud report shows, DWD has been taking in over $20 million a year the past two years in over-payment collections alone. Forfeiture penalties and charges against future unemployment benefits add significantly to the amounts flowing back into the reserve fund from claimants.
But, forfeiture over-payments and collections only tell part of the story. Department staffers have publicly noted that benefit payments are now at historically low levels. Indeed, at the May 19th Advisory Council meeting it was noted that Wisconsin has not seen such low levels of benefit payments since 2000, fifteen years ago. The big question is why benefit payments in Wisconsin are so low right now.
A look at 2013 and 2014 financial reports to the Advisory Council show large declines in 2014 in benefits being paid to claimants. The benefits charged to taxable employers for the past three years when employees were discharged are:
2012 - $788,019,106.15
2013 - $714,257,663.70
2014 - $580,681,613.52
The ratio of current year benefit payments to benefits paid the previous year, are 0.91 in 2013 but 0.81 in 2014. In other words, there was a nearly 20% decline in benefit payments in 2014 when compared to 2013, nearly double the decline in benefit payments from 2012 to 2013.
Benefits being paid to employees who quit also declined sharply in 2014.
2012 - $85,799,497.23
2013 - $81,861,854.13
2014 - $69,388,417.56
The 2013 ratio of benefit payments relative to the previous for quits was 0.95. That ratio in 2014 declined to 0.85, nearly three times the decline seen in 2013.
These declines in benefit payments in 2014 directly arise from changes in unemployment law contained in the 2013 budget act — 2013 Wis. Act 20 — regarding the elimination of numerous quit exceptions and the adoption of a new, substantial fault standard for discharges (see this previous post about these changes being included by the Joint Finance Committee in the budget bill). Understand that the original estimates presented to the Joint Finance Committee for these changes in unemployment law were a reduction of $14.1 million in benefit payments during the first fiscal year and a $23.1 reduction in benefit payments during the second fiscal year. As noted above, the actual decline for quits alone in 2014 was just over $12 million, and for discharges the decline was approximately $134 million.
NOTE: The financial reports given to the Advisory Council lack specific data about the number of claims at issue. The recent report about the activities of the Advisory Council, however, states that the new substantial fault standard led to “4,654 denied cases in 2014. See p.7 of the activities report. Using the average claim duration of 15.3 weeks and the average weekly benefit amount of $285 from the Department’s 2015 financial report, see pp. 37 and 38, each substantial fault disqualification amounted to $4,360.50. Adding up all of the denied cases in 2014 means that $20,293,767 in benefits were NOT paid out that year, $4 million more than what the Department estimated in its 2015 financial report, see p.33 of the financial report.
Because the decline in benefit payments is significantly more than what can be pieced together from available data, using a ratio of benefit payments from one year to the next to track these changes indicates at least how extraordinary the declines in 2014 were and, as indicated below, provides a mechanism for predicting what will happen in 2015 using currently available data.
Estimates for 2015 show that the decline in benefits being paid pursuant to discharges will continue. Using data for the first four months of each year, the total amount of benefits estimated to be paid in 2015 to discharged employees will be just over $480 million, $100 million less than in 2014. And so if current trends continue, the estimated level of benefits going to discharged employees in 2015 will only be 83% of the already record low amount that went to discharged employees in 2014.
On the other hand, estimated benefit payments in 2015 for employees who quit will only be $3 million less from what claimants who quit received in 2014. That is, benefits paid to employees who quit are expected to be within 97% of the 2014 numbers. Accordingly, it appears that the application of the new quit standards to claimants has stabilized and subsequent declines in benefits pursuant to quits are unlikely.
The Department has yet to acknowledge the impact the substantial fault disqualification has had on the benefits being paid out to claimants. The Department’s estimates set forth in its 2015 annual Financial Outlook Report call for a $16 million reduction in benefits to discharged employees because of substantial fault (much less than the $100 million estimated here for 2015) and an $11.5 million reduction in benefits through the elimination of various quit exceptions (nearly $9 million more than estimated here for 2015 but similar to the decline in quit benefits seen in 2014). See pp. 32-3 of the report.
These estimates severely under count the impact substantial fault has had on claimants. In its Financial Outlook Report, the Department presents for the first time a public description of the new substantial fault standard:
Substantial fault essentially means that if an employer establishes a reasonable job policy to which an employee can conform, failure to conform constitutes substantial fault.
See p.33 of the report. According to the Department, then, employees are disqualified whenever they fail to follow a reasonable employee policy. Given how steep the decline in benefits has been for discharged employees in 2014 and the first four months of 2015, it is obvious that the Department has begun applying this broad conception of substantial fault.
And so, with less money being paid out as unemployment benefits, employers’ taxes could that much more quickly fill the hole in the reserve fund created by the Great Recession. There simply has been no need in Wisconsin to reduce the number of weeks claimants are eligible for benefits when those claimants are likely to be disqualified in the first place from receiving any benefits at all.
Finally, it should be noted that even though Wisconsin now has a positive reserve fund balance, the unemployment fund is still not all that healthy. Based on standard UI fund metrics, a recent Trust Fund Solvency Report shows that Wisconsin still fares about as well as most other states do — that is, not so well (see p.56 of the report). The fund’s solvency is rated at 0.13 and a minimum of 0.60 is needed for Wisconsin to be eligible for interest free loans to cover future benefit payments. For how Wisconsin compares to other states, seep.59 of the solvency report. Among mid-western states, Wisconsin fares worst except for Indiana and Ohio, which both still have outstanding debt. Presentations by the Department to the Advisory Council have described the reserve fund’s financial problems in detail. See, e.g., the presentation contained in the Advisory Council activities report, pp.16-44. But, raising employers’ unemployment taxes appears to be unnecessary when benefit payments to claimants continue to decline markedly.
Wisconsin Unemployment 