Colorado has paid back 87% of the $1 billion it borrowed from the federal government to provide out-of-work Coloradans unemployment benefits during the pandemic. As of this week, the outstanding balance was $133.1 million. There’s still a way to go to get the depleted unemployment insurance trust fund healthy again. But with Colorado’s strong job […]
UI Trust Fund
Posted inBusiness, Economy, News, Politics and Government
What’s Working: The politics of unemployment debt in Colorado
There are just a few days left of Colorado’s legislative session as lawmakers push through a flurry of bills before the session adjourns on May 11. One of the more relevant proposals to impact employers and workers statewide — and touches on why this weekly column even exists — is Senate Bill 234, which passed […]
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What’s Working: Unpacking Colorado’s “muddled” economy
Colorado may have recovered the 375,000 jobs lost in the first two months of the pandemic, but we’re not back to peak employment yet. And while new business creations remained high so far this year, delinquencies and dissolutions are growing. These and other trends were made clearer after the Secretary of State’s quarterly Business & […]
Posted inBusiness, Economy, News, Politics and Government
Colorado lawmakers plan to overhaul unemployment system, extend benefits to immigrants as they also backfill depleted fund
Colorado lawmakers are planning to introduce a bill as soon as this week that would overhaul the state’s unemployment system and also send roughly $600 million to the depleted unemployment insurance trust fund to lower a $1 billion federal debt hanging over employers. The $600 million replenishment was expected — Gov. Jared Polis made the […]
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What’s Working: Colorado gets closer to pre-pandemic economy as jobless rate falls to 3.7%
Colorado’s unemployment rate is back down to 3.7%, which is where the state was halfway between the Great Recession and the first cases of COVID-19. This implies that people are going back to traditional jobs, perhaps lured by higher wages or employers’ increasing flexibility to allow work-from-home options. But, keep in mind, these numbers don’t […]
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Colorado needs to refill its now empty unemployment fund. Here’s how that will impact employers, workers.
When the notice about higher unemployment insurance premiums arrived this month from the Colorado labor department, business owner Jim Noon said he was shocked. “The surcharges all said zero,” said Noon, who owns Centennial Container in Denver. He remembered how employers’ premiums doubled and even tripled more than a decade ago as the state recovered […]
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What’s Working: Colorado paid $30 million in bogus unemployment claims. It could have been worse.
It probably came as a shocker when Californians learned that their state had paid out $20 billion in fraudulent unemployment claims as of October since the COVID-19 pandemic began. That’s about the same amount the Golden State has borrowed from the U.S. government to provide benefits when its own unemployment fund ran out of money […]
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What’s Working: A third-quarter check on Colorado’s economy and more on worker deaths and COVID
Twenty months into a pandemic that changed how people work — or think about what they want out of a job — the stats around Colorado’s economy appear mixed-to-dismal if you don’t have some perspective. But more on that below. This wasn’t meant to be a sequel to last week’s column on worker deaths related […]
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What’s Working: How much federal COVID relief went to unemployed Coloradans?
The day is finally here and some will weep but others will likely be cheering. It’s the last day Colorado will pay pandemic unemployment benefits, if you’re reading this on Sept. 4. According to Department of Labor and Employment officials, about 107,000 Coloradans will no longer be eligible while another 30,000 people will no longer […]
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Colorado’s unemployment fund is nearly $1 billion in debt. Small businesses are worried about paying the tab.
The last time Centennial Container saw the cost of its unemployment insurance premiums increase, owner Jim Noon didn’t think too much about the additional $40 a year per employee. “I mean, it adds up, but it’s not close-the-business material,” said Noon, who called a January 2020 state law to increase the base wage employers must […]