Other, general social insurance

Employers in 28 states owing $38.2 billion to the federal government for unemployment insurance benefits incurred an increase in their Federal Unemployment Tax Act (FUTA) tax this week.  Revenues from the tax increase will go directly toward repaying the balance of the loans.  A total of 35 states opted to borrow federal dollars because their unemployment insurance trust fund reserves were insufficient to weather the recent economic downturn.  The deep and prolonged Great Recession, current sluggish recovery, and continued high rate of long-term unemployment have further reduced revenues and increased outgoing unemployment insurance payments.

The Center for Rural Strategies, an awardee of NASI’s Improving Lives of Vulnerable Americans Through Social Security project, recently analyzed Social Security recipients by county in the U.S. The Daily Yonder (affiliated with the Center for Rural Strategies) used this breakdown of Social Security beneficiaries to find the counties most dependent on Social Security.

This Thanksgiving, nearly 24.2 million Americans, will undoubtedly be thankful for three critical social insurance programs that helped keep them out of poverty in 2010: Social Security, unemployment insurance and workers' compensation.