April 15, 2005
OLYMPIA…With less than two weeks left in the 2005 legislative
session, Democratic leaders today traded a reduction in unemployment
insurance benefits for full-time workers to buy an increase in benefits for
workers who choose to work in seasonal industries.
EHB 2255, as amended, repeals major unemployment reforms approved in 2003 to
provide an increase in unemployment benefits for seasonal workers. It also
includes a 3.85 percent across-the-board reduction for all other workers.
“Under this bill, workers are better off working for half the year in a
seasonal job than working for the same annual wage all year round,” said
Sen. Jim Honeyford, R-Sunnyside. “This is blatantly unfair to year-round
workers—especially those in low-paying jobs.”
Senate Republicans introduced a compromise amendment that would have
eliminated the across-the-board reduction and offered all seasonal workers a
$75-per-week stipend to help all workers negatively impacted by the 2003
reforms. It also called for a study of the seasonality provisions of the
state’s UI system and authorized two more employees at the state Economic
Security Department to develop economic models. The amendment was rejected
by 25 Democrats.
“There are better ways to address the concerns about seasonal workers,”
Honeyford said. “This amendment would have provided immediate assistance to
workers impacted by the 2003 reforms without hurting all the other workers.
The underlying bill cuts benefits to year-round workers and still doesn’t
provide immediate assistance to all the seasonal workers who need it.”
Currently, a seasonal worker making $35,000 a year and a nurse working
year-round making $35,000 would receive the same unemployment payment—about
$350 per week— when they lost their jobs because benefits are calculated
based on the total wages for the year.
Under EHB 2255, the seasonal worker’s wages would be considered for two
quarters of the year only for the next two years, meaning the $35,000-a-year
seasonal worker would receive the maximum benefit of $496 per week,
identical to a year-round employee making $70,000 annually. Workers with
open claims would have to wait until they filed a new claim to take
advantage of the new benefits, with some waiting as long as a year.
EHB 2255 caps the premium rate for agricultural and commercial fishing
employers at 5.4 percent and uses federal Reed Act funds to make up the
difference. It also attempts to protect other employers from increases in
their unemployment taxes by not charging unemployment claims under this bill
to their experience rating, a rating based on the number of workers who file
for claims in a given industry.
“Even under the 2003 reforms, Washington continued to pay one of the highest
per-employee unemployment taxes in the nation,” Honeyford said. “We passed
those 2003 reforms as a first step to help bring balance to our unemployment
system to improve our business climate and attract more jobs. Now we’re
unraveling everything we worked so hard to achieve.”
The 2003 reforms received bipartisan approval after Boeing demanded them as
a condition in selecting Washington as a final assembly site for its 787
(formerly called the 7E7), Honeyford said. Once Boeing gave its support for
EHB 2255, the measure quickly moved through the Legislature.
“Those reforms were designed to help industries across our state,” he said.
“Now we’re right back to where we were before the reforms.”
Even with the reforms, according to testimony by Bruce Beckett of the
Weyerhaeuser Company, Washington’s UI costs continued to be 17 percent
higher than Oregon and anywhere from 2.7 to 13 times higher in other states
where Weyerhaeuser has a presence.
“Weyerhaeuser’s experience just illustrates how important it is for us to
bring UI back into balance,” Honeyford said. “When are we going to learn
that we are in an ongoing competition with other states to attract and
retain businesses? All we’re doing with this bill is sending the message to
businesses across the nation that Washington is not interested.”