- State botched chance for aid, By Katy Stech, October 16, 2009, Charleston Post and Courier: “Thousands of out-of-work South Carolinians will miss out on five months of unemployment checks because state officials failed to tweak a rule enabling them to tap into federal stimulus money. The state’s high jobless rate, one of the worst in the country at 11.5 percent, means some unemployed residents could be receiving an additional 20 weeks of checks when they run out of their current state and federal benefits. More than 113,000 South Carolina unemployed residents already have exhausted their benefits. To get access to the additional money, state lawmakers needed to pass temporary changes to the economic index they use to trigger additional emergency benefits in times of unprecedented financial hardship. No bill was ever proposed. South Carolina is one of two states eligible for the most generous benefits but is not receiving them. The other is Mississippi…”
- Leaders aim to fix benefits, By Katy Stech, October 17, 2009, Charleston Post and Courier: “State lawmakers scrambled Friday to figure out if they could fix an oversight that has cost thousands of out-of-work South Carolinians extended unemployment benefits. Senate President Pro Tem Glenn McConnell and House Speaker Bobby Harrell said they support fixing the problem, which could involve calling a special session of the General Assembly, and deployed their staffs to determine the cheapest, easiest way to make the necessary changes to the law. ‘It’s an open-ended question at this point,’ said McConnell, who expects his staff will come up with an answer early next week. Calling a special session, by McConnell’s estimate, would cost about $17,000 but could bring the state tens of millions of dollars in federal money for unemployed residents. Meanwhile, federal policy experts indicated that, if the proper changes are made, some residents who missed out on earlier benefits could start receiving weekly paychecks again…”
Day: October 20, 2009
School Voucher Program – Washington, DC
D.C. school vouchers have a brighter outlook in Congress, By Robert Tomsho, October 19, 2009, Wall Street Journal: “The District of Columbia’s embattled school-voucher program, which lawmakers appeared to have killed earlier this year, looks like it could still survive. Congress voted in March not to fund the program, which provides certificates to pay for recipients’ private-school tuition, after the current school year. But after months of pro-voucher rallies, a television-advertising campaign and statements of support by local political leaders, backers say they are more confident about its prospects. Even some Democrats, many of whom have opposed voucher efforts, have been supportive…”
Alternative Measures of Poverty in the US
Revised formula puts 1 in 6 Americans in poverty, By Hope Yen (AP), October 20, 2009, Washington Post: “The level of poverty in America is even worse than first believed. A revised formula for calculating medical costs and geographic variations show that approximately 47.4 million Americans last year lived in poverty, 7 million more than the government’s official figure. The disparity occurs because of differing formulas the Census Bureau and the National Academy of Science use for calculating the poverty rate. The NAS formula shows the poverty rate to be at 15.8 percent, or nearly 1 in 6 Americans, according to calculations released this week. That’s higher than the 13.2 percent, or 39.8 million, figure made available recently under the original government formula. That measure, created in 1955, does not factor in rising medical care, transportation, child care or geographical variations in living costs. Nor does it consider non-cash government aid when calculating income. As a result, official figures released last month by Census may have overlooked millions of poor people, many of them 65 and older…”