Just How "Unemployed" Are They?

Is that a hammer on your tool belt, or are you just glad to see me?

A friend of mine sent me a link about unemployment cheats.

DENVER - He's got jobs to fill, yet one local employer says many applicants will only take the work if the pay is in cash. That cash, he says, would be paid under the table so the worker can continue to collect unemployment benefits.


A few local industrial companies are starting to see more potential employees trying to cheat the system. Ed Sleeman, owner of Colorado Drywall Supply, posted two new jobs eight months ago. Dozens of applications later, Sleeman still can't find two qualified truck drivers willing to load and unload building supplies, despite Colorado's 8.4 percent unemployment rate. And it's not that all of the jobseekers have been unqualified. Sleeman says about 40 of the applicants have admitted they're unemployed, and are hoping to double dip. "They'll come in and say, 'Well, I'd look at the job but if you could pay me cash I'd take the job so I could keep my unemployment,'" Sleeman said. Sleeman says he isn't the type of business owner to pay under the table. "There's no way we would do that," he said. Sleeman says he's aware double dippers have been approaching other businesses in the industrial sector.

And the unemployed aren't the only ones to game the system.

What's worse, he says, he's heard of companies willing to pay under the table to avoid extra costs, like health benefits

It doesn't surprise me. If there's a system to be gamed, someone will game it! Employers, the unemployed, you name it. One of my favorite talk show hosts was talking about some ideas he'd heard and liked for solving the insolvency of unemployment insurance. He thought that, perhaps the income of the household could be looked at as a way to identify those most in need of unemployment compensation.

He used an example of a husband a wife, one makes $100K/year, the other made $50K and was laid off. "Surely the household could survive on $100k annually?", he asked.

Just as many an unwed teen remains unmarried to keep the welfare coming in, and some divorcées have remained unmarried to keep the child support alimony* coming and oldsters have been known not to marry lest it decrease their Social Security benefits, I'm sure that this, too, would prompt people to game the system by legally keeping separate "households" to remain eligible.

Better to lower the tax rates to free up capital and eliminate the crippling effects of too much government regulation that keep small businesses from creating the very thing that would eliminate much of the strain on the unemployment insurance system:
Jobs.

Cross posted at LCR, Say
Anything.

*Friends don't let friends write sleep deprived.

Lucky Dog - a Story

I don't normally pass along stuff I receive in email, because it's usually overly maudlin or unreliable or both. Here is a story I got in a email today, and it's not the one about the lost dog missing a leg and an eye, hit by a car who "answers to Lucky". This one, if it isn't true, it ought to be!

Mary and her husband Jim had a dog named 'Lucky..'

Lucky was a real character. Whenever Mary and Jim had company come for a weekend visit they would warn their friends to not leave their luggage open because Lucky would help himself to whatever struck his fancy.. Inevitably, someone would forget and something would come up missing.

Mary or Jim would go to Lucky's toy box in the basement and there the treasure would be, amid all of Lucky's other favorite toys Lucky always stashed his finds in his toy box and he was very particular that his toys stay in the box..

It happened that Mary found out she had breast cancer. Something told her she was going to die of this disease....in fact; she was just sure it was fatal.

She scheduled the double mastectomy, fear riding her shoulders. The night before she was to go to the hospital she cuddled with Lucky. A thought struck her...what would happen to Lucky? Although the three-year-old dog liked Jim, he was Mary's dog through and through. If I die, Lucky will be abandoned, Mary thought. He won't understand that I didn't want to leave him! The thought made her sadder than thinking of her own death.

The double mastectomy was harder on Mary than her doctors had anticipated and Mary was hospitalized for over two weeks. Jim took Lucky for his evening walk faithfully, but the little dog just drooped, whining and miserable.

Finally the day came for Mary to leave the hospital. When she arrived home, Mary was so exhausted she couldn't even make it up the steps to her bedroom. Jim made his wife comfortable on the couch and left her to nap.

Lucky stood watching Mary but he didn't come to her when she called. It made Mary sad but sleep soon overcame her and she dozed.

When Mary woke, for a second, she couldn't understand what was wrong. She couldn't move her head and her body felt heavy and hot. But panic soon gave way to laughter when Mary realized the problem. She was covered, literally blanketed, with every treasure Lucky owned! While she had slept, the sorrowing dog had made trip after trip to the basement bringing his beloved mistress all his favorite things in life.

He had covered her with his love.

Mary forgot about dying. Instead she and Lucky began living again, walking further and further together every day.. It's been 12 years now and Mary is still cancer-free. Lucky still steals treasures and stashes them in his toy box, but Mary remains his greatest treasure.

Awwww.