The DeCroce Challenge

Lawmakers should stop playing word games with the unemployed (4.00 / 1)

Unemployment insurance is a form of insurance.  It pays what it pays because the insurance formula worked out for it says that is what the numbers should be.  It is not charity.  The problem with Mr DeCroce's statement is that it implies the insurance is charity.  It is not charity.  One must be employed for a certain minimum amount of time to become eligible for unemployment insurance.  During the time of employment, one pays into the system.  I paid into the system when I was employed in New Jersey.  I paid in for years and years and never had a period of sustained unemployment (a couple of weeks here and there when I was changing jobs were the longest periods I can remember being unemployed).  During those years, I was paying into the system.  When I was laid off in 2003 as a result of the Bush economy, I wound up being unemployed for nine months.  The unemployment insurance I received then was just that:  insurance benefits paid out when circumstances dictated it should be.  When I became employed again, I began paying into the system again.

Mr DeCroce is simply out of line when he tells people who paid into the system for decades, and sustained those who needed unemployment insurance before them, that they are getting too much.

The problem with unemployment insurance is not that it is too "generous" (when I hear that word, I think DeCroce believes he is handing out money to bums on the street corner, not people who have been employed for years and suddenly find themselves in unfortunate circumstances due to the continuation of the Bush recession).  The problem is that there are too many people unemployed.  That isn't the fault of the people who worked out the insurance payment schedules.  That's the fault of a large and complex mixture of economic failures, many of which can be laid at the feet of short-sightedness in government.

DBK

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by: DBK @ Wed Dec 15, 2010 at 15:14:20 PM UTC

I agree with a lot of what you said... (0.00 / 0)

The problem is not with the formula.  The problem is that politicians raided the UI funds to use as their own personal pet project funds and now that there are so many unemployed people the funds are broke.  It doesn't help that we have extended unemployment benefits up to a ridiculously long 99 weeks.  I don't have a problem with extending benefits from the standard 26 weeks during a recession but 99 weeks (almost 2 years) seems just a little excessive.

I can't stand these sweeping generalizations that politicians make.  Sure I know a few people who are perfectly happy collecting UI for two years but at the same time I know some people who are unemployed and it is killing them to have to collect a government check and spend each day applying to tons of jobs.

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by: cwood123 @ Wed Dec 15, 2010 at 16:15:24 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

Raiding of the UI Funds was stopped by Gov Corzine (0.00 / 0)

It was started in the Whitman Adminstration and continued unabated until Corzine took office in 2006. Those politicians' "pet"projects were actually well intentioned, but short sighted and added to NJ's proeblems.

The $4 billion were diverted for funding and reimbursing hospitals for their losses for treating the uninsured at their emergency rooms! It's just another cost to ALL of us for America having a broken health care delivery system!

"Discrimination caused by ignorance and fear is a tax on human progress" - Barbra Casbar Siperstein

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by: Babs NJSD @ Wed Dec 15, 2010 at 17:46:28 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

Nickeled and Dimed (4.00 / 2)

I have the perfect book for him to read to get started thinking about how he himself might manage on unemployment insurance for a long term.

Assemblyman, I think you should read Nickle and Dimed: On (Not) Getting By in America, in which Barbara Ehrenreich spent a year working at low-wage jobs, and trying to live on nothing but what those jobs paid. That was an education, for a highly-educated woman. True, that was work and where you seem to have trouble is grasping the circumstances of the unemployed. But empathy may come hard to you, Assemblyman DeCroce. Maybe you should start with a book.  

It's not a particularly snappy signature, but here's what I think we need in the next NJ Democratic State Chair.  

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by: Rosi Efthim @ Wed Dec 15, 2010 at 16:07:01 PM UTC

firstamend07 (0.00 / 0)

By the way, firstamend07 gets credit for throwing this idea out there last night.  

It's not a particularly snappy signature, but here's what I think we need in the next NJ Democratic State Chair.  

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by: Rosi Efthim @ Wed Dec 15, 2010 at 16:33:37 PM UTC

Appreciated! (4.00 / 1)

Alex the Grinch should not be left off the hook and neither should his " quiet" fellow Republicans.

Every Republican must be asked the same question. " Do you agree or disagree with the Assembly Minority leader?"

I called this low life's office and e-mailed him multiple times.

This callous bas**rd should be unemployed himself.  

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by: firstamend07 @ Wed Dec 15, 2010 at 19:55:21 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

Do the unemployed really care? (0.00 / 0)

I hope I'm wrong, but if The Grinch said that unemployment benefits should be extended or increased, or both, he would be getting ten times as many calls from TParty activists as he will from unemployed for saying their benefits are too generous.

With so many unemployewd people in this state, and in this country, it's amazing that The Grinch can say what he said with so little response except for Democratic press releases, some verbal barbs from Sweeney, and a few expressions of outrage on forums like this one.  In Europe the unemployed and underprivileged are fighting in the streets, even physically attacking the royal family in England.

I even wonder how many unemployed even bothered to vote last election, considering how much was at stake.  I haven't seen any polling on the subject, but somehow I wouldn't be shocked if the unemployed turnout was less than average, and when they did turn out a large percentage even voted for Republicans.  

I'd really like to know, if it can be determined, how much response The Grinch got for his remarks.  If I was a betting man, I'd bet he got more expressions of support from the rightwingers and TNuts than he did calls and emails from unemployed persons expressing outrage over his comments.

http://christiegonewild.blogsp...

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by: ken bank @ Wed Dec 15, 2010 at 23:17:53 PM UTC

[ Parent ]