$600 per week<\/strong> from the federal government<\/a>.\u00a0 This is not \u201cup to their full salary.\u201d\u00a0 This is regardless of their prior salary.<\/p>\nThis is just mind-blowing.\u00a0 This works out to $15 per hour.\u00a0 For a good half of the population, they would receive more income by losing their job than keeping it, or by finding a new one.<\/p>\n
Here are some of the ways people are defending it on twitter:<\/p>\n
\u201cBut you can\u2019t quit your job and get unemployment, you have to be laid off.\u201d\u00a0 True, but workers will be angling to get laid off.\u00a0 Strictly speaking, you can\u2019t be fired \u201cfor cause\u201d and get unemployment, but I don\u2019t know whether all the usual checks to prevent that will still happen.\u00a0 And in any case, there\u2019s not a clear line between the two situations; will small businesses jump through all the hoops needed to collect government money if they know they can lay off workers without causing them economic harm instead?\u00a0 Will workers do their best to keep the business going if their buddy who got fired is celebrating more money per week than he\u2019s ever gotten before?\u00a0 And \u201cunemployment\u201d is also defined as \u201cunable to work because your kid is home from school\u201d \u2014 which for many people, is<\/strong> something under their control, in terms of how hard they work at seeking accommodations, which parent stays with the child, at what age they deem the kid old enough to care for themselves, etc.<\/p>\n\u201cBut there are no jobs for people to go to, and people shouldn\u2019t be working.\u201d\u00a0 Listen to the radio:\u00a0 Amazon is advertising their need for workers.\u00a0 In the paper the other day was a call from the local grocery store:\u00a0 \u201cWe\u2019re hiring at all our locations \u2013 immediately!\u00a0 Work for us as long as you need.\u00a0 We WILL be flexible with any needs you have at home.\u201d\u00a0 And these are jobs that I think we can all agree that people are needed to fill; we need workers to stock grocery store shelves and man the registers (and wipe the carts!).\u00a0 We need workers to process online orders for all the goods we cannot get by going out to the store.<\/p>\n
\u201cBut if you are unemployment, you have to be looking for work and have to accept job offers or you lose your benefits.\u201d\u00a0 Given the circumstances, will these provisions really be enforced?<\/p>\n
\u201cBut it would have been too hard for states to reprogram their computer systems so we had to do a flat amount.\u201d\u00a0 This was something a Washington insider claimed on twitter.\u00a0 Look, I\u2019m not an expert.\u00a0 But how hard would it have been for states to have sent datafiles with not just names of claimants, but their past salary?<\/p>\n
There is a huge moral hazard issue here \u2014 a massive incentive for the lower-income half of the workforce, and the comparatively lower income portion, beyond that, to enjoy the extra benefits and as a result, act in ways that cause greater harm to the economy and the well-being of those around them.<\/p>\n
And, again, near as I can tell, people don\u2019t see that because they either<\/p>\n
(a) believe that state government runs like a well-oiled machine and will ensure that all UI recipients perform their duty to look for work and accept it if offered, and will judge \u201csuitable work\u201d appropriately, and\/or<\/p>\n
(b) believe that all workers hold themselves to the highest ethical and \u201cwork ethic\u201d standards and will forgo the ability to sit at home and collect more money than otherwise, in order to serve others by stocking the shelves at the local Jewel \u2014<\/p>\n
plus maybe a few who believe that<\/p>\n
(c) if this causes employers to bid up wages so high that the math works again in favor of taking jobs, then that\u2019s a good thing (with no inflationary consequences),<\/p>\n
and there may be some whose income is so high that (d) they think that $15 per hour is a trivial sum and don\u2019t see why it would cause anyone to be concerned.<\/p>\n
So readers, what would you do, if you were in this situation?<\/p>\n
\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u00a0<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
\u201cA conservative is a liberal who has been mugged by reality\u201d \u2014 Irving Kristol. \u201cIf you\u2019re not a liberal at twenty you have no heart; if you\u2019re not a conservative at forty you have no brain.\u201d \u2014 unknown. Folks, the stimulus\/relief bill I wrote about earlier this week finally passed, in its somewhat less pork-laden […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2209,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[1418,1428],"class_list":["post-16754","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-coronavirus","tag-moral-hazard"],"yoast_head":"\n
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