Why thousands of unemployed California workers are unlikely to get extra $300 benefit
About 192,000 California residents now receiving unemployment benefits are unlikely to qualify for the extra $300 a week payment that begins next week, according to a study released Tuesday by the independent California Policy Lab.
The federally-funded benefit, created by President Donald Trump’s executive action last month, will nearly double the average state jobless benefit for an estimated 3.79 million claimants in California, the lab said.
But it won’t be available to people with a weekly benefit of less than $100 under federal guidelines. They tend to be low-wage or part-time workers.
That’s likely to hit younger people particularly hard, the study found. Unable to get the higher amount would be one in five claimants aged 16 to 19 and one in 10 aged 20 to 24.
And overall, those likely to be ineligible for the $300 are more likely to identify as Black, Asian-American and less educated.
There’s also some sobering news for people who will get the benefit. The states’ median family income is $1,657 a week, and the federal government considers $828.50 a week to be “very low income.”
The maximum regular unemployment benefit in California is $450. Even with the extra $300, that could still keep claimants with families below the very low income line.
The $300 replaces the extra $600 jobless people got between late March and late July through a coronavirus relief law Trump signed in the early weeks of the pandemic. That sum put most people above the low income threshold.
“While the...program will be a temporary boost for unemployed Californians, it’s a 50% reduction from the $600 that unemployed Californians were previously receiving,” noted Till von Wachter, a co-author of the analysis faculty director at the California Policy Lab.
The state plans to begin paying the extra $300 next week. The payments will be retroactive to August 1, and it’s unclear whether the state’s Employment Development Department will pay claimants a lump sum.
Eligible beneficiaries who receive unemployment payments of more than $100 a week can qualify for the $300. They also must get a payment on their regular jobless claim and must have provided self-certification that they are unemployed or partially unemployed for reasons related to the COVID-19 pandemic.
The first group of beneficiaries will involve those who received payments for weeks between July 26 and August 15 and have previously given information they were unemployed because of a reason relate to COVID-19 on their initial application.
The second phase will involve those who were unable to indicate they were unemployed because of the pandemic but still meet the requirements for the $300. The department plans to send them notifications, and they will be asked to complete a self-certification that would tell the state if they are unemployed for a pandemic-related reason.
The state is receiving $4.5 billion from the federal government for the program, which it estimates will last a minimum of three weeks. The policy lab study said it could last four weeks.
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