September 1, 2023
Despite Staggering Improper Payments, New Labor Department Report Calls for Reviving Pandemic Unemployment Assistance
As America prepares to celebrate Labor Day, it’s timely to wonder what the US Department of Labor (DOL) has been up to. One noteworthy recent action was DOL’s August 21 release of a report on improper payments made by the troubled Pandemic Unemployment Assistance (PUA) program. PUA was a temporary federal program in 2020 and 2021, which…
August 23, 2023
Labor Department Report Finds Pandemic Unemployment Program Had a Staggering 36 Percent Improper Payment Rate
On August 21, the US Department of Labor (DOL) released its long-awaited “improper payment report” on the troubled Pandemic Unemployment Assistance (PUA) program. PUA was an unprecedented federal unemployment benefit program that operated from early 2020 through September 2021. Prior reports from the DOL Inspector General and the Government Accountability Office suggested that PUA was subject to historic, but previously unconfirmed, levels…
August 14, 2023
Tracking Plans to Make Pandemic Benefit Expansions Permanent
In 2008, former White House Chief of Staff and Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel famously said what has come to be known as Rahm’s rule: “You never want a serious crisis to go to waste. And what I mean by that [is] it’s an opportunity to do things that you think you could not do before.” It’s clear that…
May 11, 2023
The House Acts to Recover More Pandemic Unemployment Fraud
FacebookTwitterLinkedIn This week, the House is considering Republican-authored legislation (H.R. 1163, the Protecting Taxpayers and Victims of Unemployment Fraud Act) designed to promote more recovery of fraudulent unemployment checks paid during the pandemic, among other purposes. That’s long overdue, since little of potentially $400 billion in such misspending—including an estimated $60 billion or more in fraud, according to the Government Accountability Office—has…
May 2, 2023
In Next Recession, Don’t Let Uncle Sam Be Uncle Sucker Again
Following recent bank failures, expectations for a recession have revived. If unemployment rises significantly, Congress will likely re-open its stimulus policy playbook — including by extending unemployment benefits. Yet given an increased focus on containing federal spending, there could be constraints on how much Congress provides. How can policymakers best target future federal aid? They should start by ensuring…
December 9, 2022
“Automatic Stimulus”: How It Would Have Increased the Record Unemployment Benefits Paid During the Great Recession and Pandemic
Key Points Read the PDF. Executive Summary The COVID-19 pandemic saw unemployment claims reach a high of over 33 million in June 2020—over two and a half times the prior record set during the Great Recession. From March 2020 until temporary federal programs expired in September 2021, nearly 1.6 billion weeks of benefit checks were…
September 21, 2022
Lessons from the Unprecedented Fraud and Abuse of the Unemployment Benefits System During the Pandemic
Chairman DeSaulnier, Ranking Member Allen, and other members of the Subcommittee on Health, Employment, Labor, and Pensions, thank you for inviting me to testify at this morning’s hearing examining the administration of the Unemployment Insurance system. My name is Matt Weidinger, and I am a senior fellow and Rowe Scholar in poverty studies at the…