Thought I would follow up today with a question that's been on my mind, and was rehashed in Greg Dagley's piece at the Buzz on the COBRA portion of the Stimulus bill.
Here's the question - is the COBRA stimulus package for everyone who has lost a job? I know it's for the folks who have been laid off between the dates in question, but Greg's piece used the following language, which I think speaks volumes:
"The subsidy only applies to employees who’ve been involuntarily terminated for reasons other than
gross misconduct. Employees who voluntarily leave are not eligible. So employers will now need to look through their HRIS and determine which termination codes can be used to identify involuntarily terminated employee that should be eligible for the subsidy. Since there’s some grey area in determining who may have been terminated for “gross misconduct,” this task won’t be as easy as it sounds."
Here's the scoop from my perspective. That language is straight out of the unemployment office handbook, and if you're an HR pro who has ever termed anyone and then fought an unemployment claim because you didn't feel your company should pay unemployment for someone who didn't try to make it work, you know the following reality:
You can't fight an unemployment claim for an employee who was termed for performance reasons in most states.
Doesn't matter how many chances the employee was given, and how attainable the performance levels were. You can't win that type of claim. In order for an involuntarily termed employee to be denied unemployment, they have to steal something and be caught redhanded or simply refuse to come to work without notice multiple times. That's pretty much it. Want to talk about performance and how the employee didn't even try? Most administrators in the unemployment office will listen, then rule in the employee's favor.
I'm all for a net to help those who need it, both from an unemployment and a health care perspective. But guess what? The way unemployment has migrated to "applying to employees who’ve been involuntarily terminated for reasons other than gross misconduct", it's easy to see the COBRA bill going the same way.
And, of course, it's easy to see the COBRA stimulus bill being extended indefinitely while the Obama administration figures out what to do with health care. Which means that employers bear the cost, at least until they get the "benefit" of a tax break.
If employers are going to bear the upfront cost, they deserve some dialog about how folks who refuse to work hard are treated under the system. I know it's a thousand shades of gray, but we don't need another government system administered like the unemployment office.
Comments