Vox explains why it is difficult to collect unemployment benefits in Florida

With the U.S. officially in recession since March because of the COVID-19 pandemic, yesterday's news that U.S. GDP fell at an annualized rate of 32.9% during April-June 2020, the worst on record, and U.S. weekly jobless claims were 1.434 million last week should come as no surprise. These bad tidings are putting pressure on Congress and the Administration to pass another relief bill.* Even when one does pass, and it will, eventually, a lot of workers in states like Florida will have trouble collecting on their benefits. Vox explains why it's so hard to get unemployment benefits in the Sunshine State.

It's not the computers. It's the politicians behind them.
...
Millions of Americans across the country have lost their jobs. But whether or not those people can get the unemployment benefits they deserve actually depends on where they live. In some states, more than two thirds of jobless people typically collect unemployment benefits. But in others, like Florida, fewer than one in 10 unemployed people get those benefits.

That massive difference has often been blamed on technology; Florida’s unemployment system is notoriously difficult to use. But technology doesn’t build itself. The real explanation requires a look at the ideology of the people who did.

Last week, I used a Hysterical Raisins paroday poster to dump on Florida's current Governor in Samantha Bee mocks governors' responses to the pandemic in a parody of 'Diners, Drive-Ins, and Dives'. This week, it's Rick Scott's turn. Here's the poster Nonnie9999 created for Direct from Scott’s Bowels, which satirizes Scott's role in creating Florida' unemployment system.


I'll let Infidel 753 speak for me in his comment on Nonnie's post.

I pity the newly-unemployed in Florida. Dealing with unemployment insurance here in Oregon (when I needed to last year) wasn’t too bad, but this state has been run by Democrats for as long as I can remember. It really does make a difference which party is in charge, something many people may be just now realizing.

The ultimate goal — which it delivered on — was to lower unemployment taxes paid by Florida businesses

Figures. Republicans.

I second all his emotions.

That's it for July. Stay tuned for the first post of August.

*Never mind that HEROES Act has been sitting on Mitch McConnell's desk for months, but he refuses to put it up for a vote.