Unemployment Law and a SUB Plan

According to CNN, "Jobless Americans have collected $434 billion in unemployment benefits over the past four years." Furthermore, 17.6 million Americans have reportedly utilized some facet of the Unemployment Benefit system since 2008.

Separation benefits are one form of company-provided benefits not regulated by U.S. government. However, could, or should, for that matter, a SUB [Supplemental Unemployment Benefit] Plan become an employment law? Think of how beneficial having such a system in place would be to our current economy. Two issues currently on the political financial table are either continuing or ending income tax breaks and either continuing or ending federal unemployment benefit extensions. A SUB Plan....income tax savings? Check. Efficient use of unemployment benefits? Check. While providing unemployed Americans with money to support their periods of unemployment? Seems an excellent idea.

Another hotspot right now is the myriad of grievances presented by the many "Occupy Wall Street" movements, including are recent corporate bailouts by the government followed by ongoing, seemingly endless layoffs, growing the proverbial 99%.

Consider the 434 billion dollars distributed by both State of Federal governments to those people who lost jobs during the Great Recession. Logically, under a SUB Plan structure, every dollar of that 434 billion paid to the unemployed would have been spent by the governments regardless. However, that 434 billion dollars would at the same time have been saved by whichever organizations were laying off those people collecting these exorbitant amounts of money. Because a SUB Plan allows a company to offset weekly Unemployment benefits from the weekly separation benefit payments, allowing terminated employees to receive amounts equal to the pre-displaced wage during the unemployment period, there is the probability that this $434 billion would have been saved by companies in this country over the past four years and the economy would be in a far better place and the unemployment rate far lower.

Stimulating the economy requires spending by the people in that economy. This includes getting some of the unemployed back to work. Hiring people requires a company have money to spend on headcount. Imagine if more companies in this country had utilized a SUB Plan. Funds delivered in the form of unemployment benefits would not only go to the people who needed them, but also save money for the companies doing the layoffs. Logically this would provide a company a greater cash flow, more money, fewer required layoffs, and faster recovery.