“To support older workers returning to work, eligible workers age 50 or older who obtain new, full-time employment at wages of less than $50,000 may receive wage insurance for up to two years to partially offset earnings losses in new jobs that pay less than their previous jobs.”
I guess it’s less disruptive to the labor markets as outright extension of unemployment benefits, but it seems like this sort of system is open to all kinds of abuses.
“Other provisions include reemployment services for every displaced worker, training awards of up to $4,000 a year for up to two years, weekly stipends for child care and transportation while looking for work, a national job-center network and investments to better connect current job services.”
How much more taxpayer money is this president going to just hand out like candy!!! Very interesting that these handouts are coming in an election year…
Most likely this will not pass. But now, Obama gets to give speeches to the 50+ group with about $50k in income and pretend to be their friend. Old people = high voter turnout and $50k is conveniently around the average US income.
I forget… didn’t the Germans do something like this, basically subsidizing companies if they agree not to lay off workers? This one would presumably allow companies to hire older workers and < 50k without having those workers take as large a hit.
On the one hand, if one’s over 50 and laid off in a structurally changing industry, chances are you may never work again at something that can meet the kind of obligations a 50 year old typically has. I’m not sure what the world will look like with lots of 50 year olds with virtually no hope of ever getting paid enough again, but it doesn’t sound very promising, particularly if they have guns.
On the other hand, it does seem that what is happening is that the baby boom generation has gotten to live high on the hog for a long long time and is quite happy to have everyone else to pay for the tax cuts and entitlement increases that they voted for themselves.
I believe you are correct about Germany as well. It is definitely one of the more “socialized” countries in Europe (along with France) – a place where workers still matter. In fact, having invested around the globe for some time now, it’s obvious to me that almost every other developed country has programs like the one being proposed (either directly similar or aiming at the equivalent goals). Emerging markets are still a free-for-all, and the US is somewhere in between.
My observation is that we had a long running bull market of 25+ years during the prime of many of these peoples’ lives and that no one really prepared for a major reshuffling of the deck chairs becuase no one imagined that it could happen. It’s definitely a tough spot – do you kick people to the curb? Or do you burden the country with even more debt? It seems that the lesson is that one has to either start their own (successful) business or reailze that they need to keep improving their skills or face eventual redundancy.
Doesn’t it seem like the problem is the general lack of employability in people who would be helped by a program like this? Let’s focus on not creating unemplyoable people instead of coddling them after they are created.