West Virginia jobless fund faces insolvency
By Naomi Spencer
20 September 2010
West Virginia’s unemployment compensation fund is on the brink of insolvency. The fund, at its lowest level in three years, is projected to run out by February 2011. Like 32 other states that have already run dry, West Virginia may be forced to borrow federal funds to continue paying unemployment benefits.
The fund currently stands at $99.5 million. Over the month of August, the state paid out $19 million in benefits and saw more than 7,000 initial claims filed. WorkForce West Virginia, the agency that oversees jobless benefits, projects that at the current rate disbursements will surpass revenues by December.
Unemployment continues to rise. In August, West Virginia registered an 8.9 percent jobless rate, an increase of 0.3 percent over July.
WorkForce West Virginia figures indicate that the unemployment rate increased in 44 of the state’s 55 counties in August. In 17 counties, unemployment is higher than 11 percent, including one swath of southwest West Virginia that averaged more than 13 percent. Clay County registered a 15.1 percent unemployment rate, Mason stood at 14 percent, and McDowell County recorded a jobless rate of 13.1 percent.
In the northern-most Hancock County, the jobless rate has climbed to 13.2 percent. The economic decline of the northern panhandle has followed that of the southern coalfields region, shedding thousands of steel production jobs, including hundreds since the onset of the recession in 2008.
Other manufacturing jobs in glass and chemical industries have also shut down in the past two years. In turn, the decline in industry has rippled through the large transportation and hauling industry in the state. Many workers in transportation and related jobs are ineligible for unemployment benefits because they are contract laborers or classified as self-employed.
The increase in the official unemployment rate signals a significant worsening of the social crisis in the state. Historically, West Virginia has suffered some of the deepest economic distress in the US, with persistent poverty and joblessness across many counties.
However, because of the long-term character of the jobs crisis, such conditions are masked in the official month-to-month figures, which have consistently been lower than the national rate. Fully half of West Virginia residents aged 16 and older are classified as “not in labor force,” and tens of thousands of workers have no choice but to subsist on minimum wage, part-time and seasonal jobs.
Social distress is the product of deliberate fiscal policy. West Virginia is one of a handful of states across the US that did not record a deficit in 2009, in large part because a long-term austerity regimen for social programs and infrastructure.
Indeed, as thousands more residents are being driven into poverty and want, the state legislature passed a budget with no spending increases in any services. Wall Street lauded this decision; on July 9, rating agency Moody’s Investment Services upgraded the state’s bond rating to AA1, praising its “fiscal conservatism and consistent fund balances.”
State funding for basic safety net programs such as food stamps and Medicaid has remained level, although the number of applicants has soared. According to new US Census figures, for example, the state Medicaid rolls swelled by 22.9 percent between 2008 and 2009. The Medicare population grew by 7.7 percent.
These numbers correspond to a massive drop-off in the number of working families covered under employer-sponsored health insurance plans. From 2008 to 2009, the percentage of workers in employer-based plans fell by 4.7 percent, and workers purchasing coverage through their employers fell by 21.7 percent. Residents enrolled in private insurance plans also fell by 5.6 percent. Not surprisingly, underfunded and understaffed public health care programs are straining to serve the population.
A particularly stark manifestation of the social crisis is a spike in copper theft from utility lines in the coalfields region. The wire is sold for a few dollars at scrap yards.
This year alone at least three people have died and hundreds of others have been seriously burned while attempting to take the wiring. On September 16, a man suffered third-degree burns over half his body at an Appalachian Power station in Raleigh County while trying to strip copper. In July, a Boone County man was killed and another severely injured while taking down a line.
Since the beginning of the year, more than 100 miles’ worth of copper electric distribution lines has been stolen, according to Appalachian Power. The company has two work crews in a four-county area that are dedicated solely to replacing copper lines. According to the company, wire that is meant to last for 20 to 30 years is now being replaced every couple of weeks in some towns. Hundreds of residents are regularly left without power as a result.
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MEXICANOCCUPATION.blogspot.com
FAIRUS.org
JUDICIALWATCH.org
ALIPAC.us
THE ENTIRE REASON THE BORDERS ARE LEFT OPEN IS TO CUT WAGES!
“We could cut unemployment in half simply by reclaiming the jobs taken by illegal workers,” said Representative Lamar Smith of Texas, co-chairman of the Reclaim American Jobs Caucus. “President Obama is on the wrong side of the American people on immigration. The president should support policies that help citizens and legal immigrants find the jobs they need and deserve rather than fail to enforce immigration laws.”
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“The principal beneficiaries of our current immigration policy are affluent Americans who hire immigrants at substandard wages for low-end work. Harvard economist George Borjas estimates that American workers lose $190 billion annually in depressed wages caused by the constant flooding of the labor market at the low-wage end.” Christian Science Monitor
MOST OF THE FORTUNE 500 ARE GENEROUS DONORS TO LA RAZA – THE MEXICAN FASCIST POLITICAL PARTY. THESE FIGURES ARE DATED. CNN CALCULATES THAT WAGES ARE DEPRESSED $300 - $400 BILLION PER YEAR!
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IN FACT THERE ARE SO MANY MILLIONS OF MEXICANS USING FRAUDULENT SOCIAL SECURITY NUMBERS WITH COMMON HISPANIC NAMES, THAT E-VERIFY MAY BE ALREADY BE A WASTE OF TIME.
HOWEVER, EVEN WITH THE STAGGERING UNEMPLOYMENT, FOR WHICH OBAMA HAS DONE NADA, HE’S STILL MAKING IT EASY FOR ILLEGALS TO TAKE OUR JOBS
Obama Administration Challenges Arizona E-Verify Law
The Obama administration has asked the Supreme Court to strike down a 2007 Arizona law that punishes employers who hire illegal aliens, a law enacted by then-Governor Janet Napolitano. (Solicitor General's Amicus Curiae Brief). Called the “Legal Arizona Workers Act,” the law requires all employers in Arizona to use E-Verify and provides that the business licenses of those who hire illegal workers shall be repealed. From the date of enactment, the Chamber of Commerce and other special interest groups have been trying to undo it, attacking it through a failed ballot initiative and also through a lawsuit. Now the Chamber is asking the United States Supreme Court to hear the case (Chamber of Commerce v. Candelaria), and the Obama Administration is weighing in against the law.
To date, Arizona’s E-Verify law has been upheld by all lower courts, including the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals. The Ninth Circuit, in particular, viewed it as an exercise of a state’s traditional power to regulate businesses. (San Francisco Chronicle, June 2, 2010). Obama’s Justice Department, however, disagrees. Acting Solicitor General Neal Katyal said in his filing with the Supreme Court that the lower courts were wrong to uphold the statute because federal immigration law expressly preempts any state law imposing sanctions on employers hiring illegal immigrants. Mr. Katyal argues that this is not a licensing law, but “a statute that prohibits the hiring of unauthorized aliens and uses suspension and revocation of all state-issued licenses as its ultimate sanction.” (Solicitor General's Amicus Curiae Brief, p. 10). This is the administration’s first court challenge to a state’s authority to act against illegal immigration, and could be a preview of the battle brewing over Arizona’s recent illegal immigration crackdown through SB 1070.
Napolitano has made no comment on the Department of Justice’s decision to challenge the 2007 law, but federal officials said that she has taken an active part in the debate over whether to do so. (Politico, May 28, 2010). As Governor of Arizona, Napolitano said she believed the state law was valid and became a defendant in the many lawsuits against it. (Id.).
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