SB 44 – Work Sharing Unemployment Benefits Program
Authored by Sen. Eric Bassler (R-Washington)

Establishes a voluntary work sharing unemployment insurance program. Requires an employer that desires to participate in the program to submit a work sharing plan for approval by the commissioner of the Indiana Department of Workforce Development (DWD). Establishes the work sharing benefit as equal to an affected employee’s unemployment benefit reduced by a percentage equal to the percentage of the employee’s normal weekly work hours that the employee works under the approved work sharing plan.

Chamber position: Support

The latest: A testimony-only hearing took place on Wednesday in the Senate Pensions and Labor Committee. Chairman Phil Boots (R-Crawfordsville) would not allow the committee to vote because he doesn’t believe in work share – no matter how much irrefutable data and first-hand experiences are presented to him. He does not support the idea of keeping workers employed part time during a recession via work share; he would rather employees be cut loose entirely with employers having to waste time and money hiring and retraining new workers later. It’s clear Sen. Boots only held the hearing because of pressure by Senate leadership. Based on the comments of committee members during the hearing and in private conversations, we know SB 44 would have passed overwhelmingly if given the chance. Senator Boots very likely would have been the only “no” vote. Moreover, several members of the committee – from both parties – expressed frustration and anger at the chairman’s refusal to allow SB 44 to be voted on.

Indiana Chamber action/commentary: Going into the hearing, we knew Chairman Boots didn’t want to vote on the bill but thought he might bow to the wishes of his committee. That notion was dashed at the onset by the remarks Sen. Boots gave after Sen. Bassler presented the bill. In four decades of Statehouse experience, I’ve never seen such a disrespectful display by a chairman. For several minutes, right before testimony was allowed, Sen. Boots went through the reasons why he didn’t like work share – all based on false premises or incomplete and outdated information – and why he didn’t want to see it enacted in Indiana. Again, this was before employers and others were lined up to testify in support.

Senator Boots offered it could be better for an individual to lose his or her job (and benefits) entirely than to be on work share because then they would have time for further education or training. That’s insulting given the current climate. When people are laid off and need to feed their children, pay their rent or mortgage, or get medicine, we highly doubt they are looking at the bright side of how they now have time to train. Not to mention, SB 44 would permit employees to receive training from their employers during the work share period.

Mark Miller, president and CEO of Indianapolis-based Markey’s Rental & Staging, kicked off the public testimony. Miller talked about how his company has successfully used work share to retain workers at its offices in Iowa and Ohio. He relayed that his business has been hard hit by the pandemic and was forced to completely lay off 100 workers in Indiana but said that 40 of these jobs would have been saved if Indiana had a work share program. Likewise, Danielle Tucker, labor and employment general counsel at Cummins, shared how the company and its workers had benefitted from work share in other states. Tucker also said that the full layoffs and production stoppage in Indiana would have been avoided if work share had been an option.

We thank Miller and Tucker for their thoughtful testimony, along with those who sent written remarks to deliver to the committee and the hundreds of Indiana employers that signed on in support of work share.

In between these two Chamber member companies, I testified about the well-documented benefits of work share and the new data from the Brookings Institution on what it cost Indiana by not having work share in place during 2020 and going forward (see last week’s Legislative Report article). I also emphasized that there is still time for Indiana to take advantage of federal funding available for computer system and administrative costs as well as to pay for the actual work share claims. In conclusion, I refuted claims by Sen. Boots about fraud and his assertion that this is adding another government program. Fraud is highly unlikely under work share because participating employers have to submit employee information in advance. Further, under federal law, work share is a program within the unemployment insurance system.

Jessica Fraser from the Indiana Institute for Working Families also testified in strong support.

No one testified in opposition to work share (officially), but two who claimed to be neutral made negative remarks about the program and aligned themselves with Chairman Boots.

Andrew Berger of the Indiana Manufacturers Association (IMA) claimed that none of its members contacted the group to voice their support for work share. Perhaps that’s because the members know IMA would do nothing about it based on its history with this issue. The Indiana Chamber has many manufacturers among its membership – some of which also belong to the IMA – that have reached out to us about wanting work share and were on the list of hundreds we submitted to the committee. It’s too bad the IMA won’t ask its board to vote on this issue. Manufacturers are the biggest users of work share in states that have it.

The surprise of the hearing was Chairman Boots calling in Josh Richardson, deputy commissioner of DWD to bat cleanup for him. We had been assured that the Holcomb administration was neutral and that DWD was not going to testify. Why does that matter? No one has done more to stand in the way of work share year after year than Richardson. He has influenced Boots and together they have repeatedly sabotaged this commonsense alternative to full layoffs. This time, Richardson downplayed any benefits from the program and backed up negative assertions from Boots with careful wording about how work share could be looked at multiple ways.

There is overwhelming bipartisan support in the entire General Assembly for work share, but for nearly a decade the legislation has been stopped from proceeding in this committee.

It doesn’t matter what impartial research says. It doesn’t matter the negative impact on employers and employees. And it doesn’t matter to Sen. Boots that he has kept Indiana’s UI trust fund from receiving as much as $200 million in federal funding to pay work share benefits. The refusal to have meaningful debate and to allow work share legislation to reach the House and Senate floor is unconscionable given the pandemic and push for economic recovery.

Resource: Kevin Brinegar at (317) 264-6882 or email: kbrinegar@indianachamber.com