Workforce
State and local governments face a tight labor market and a competitive disadvantage with the private sector. But salaries aren’t the only issue, with cities, counties and states all grappling with training, retention, remote work and increased union activity.
DHS is using federal funds to reimburse local police who partner with ICE, a policy that could reshape law enforcement in rural communities with limited staffing and resources.
The coronavirus pandemic has thrown thousands of new applicants into the state’s unemployment system, overwhelming claims processing and phone calls. But these issues have been happening for years.
Missouri’s Department of Labor will reinstate unemployment benefit requirements that were waived during the height of the coronavirus pandemic, including a one-week waiting period and required job-seeking efforts.
500,000 Houstonians lost their jobs as a result of the coronavirus pandemic. As the city begins to reopen, it must establish a new working normal as recovery will still take months or even years.
The state altered unemployment benefit payments from weekly to biweekly without notifying any of the applicants or recipients. A spokesperson claims the weekly payments were only to help offset the pandemic emergency.
The pandemic has highlighted long-standing public workforce problems. But the crisis has also prompted some changes that point the way to work environments that support high performance.
Many Floridians have received very little or no unemployment support from the state during the coronavirus pandemic. Tired of no answers, and jammed phone lines, activists plan to take the streets to demand change.
Public health agencies have steadily lost workers since the 2008 recession. Tech can help address some of the biggest demands from the pandemic, but humans and better funding are still badly needed.
Whether or not an employee is working from an office, there are still some health and security risks that are a company’s responsibility. Questions have been raised about overtime and workers’ comp.
About 70,000 New Jersey workers have exhausted their unemployment benefits during the pandemic. Some received relief as the state opened slots for a 13-week extension. However, the rest still struggle to find work.
For many Detroit workers, taking the bus is the only option when it comes to getting to work. Unfortunately, that also means risking the spread of the coronavirus pandemic while on public transit.
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The last recession pummeled the government workforce. Now, the pandemic has hit and once again, layoffs have become a fact of life. But not every state and local government is cutting jobs to stanch revenue losses.
California needs 10,000 workers to act as contact tracers, but it has only trained about 950. Gov. Newsom has said if state workers don’t volunteer to be contact tracers, they might be temporarily reassigned to the job.
Federal workers are worried that they will be forced to return to work before health precautions have been implemented. Government agencies are using different approaches to reopening their offices.
Because some unemployment insurance cases require human intervention, even states with updated technology can barely keep up with the surge of unemployment insurance claims caused by COVID-19.
Every state is at least partially reopened, but layoffs persist across the nation and unemployment continues to rise. Even as many are returning to work, they may still struggle to make ends meet.
The state’s computer crashed Monday when workers flooded the system with requests for relief. Immigrants could apply for a one-time payment of $500 per individual or $1,000 per household.
Washington state halted unemployment payments for two days as they tried to block $1.6 million of fraudulent claims. While the state has not been ravaged by unemployment, about 1 million unemployed workers still seek aid.
Unprecedented. The word has taken on the quality of ubiquity in the COVID-19 era. It signals in part that some things are changing everything — the Internet that allows work to be virtual and done anywhere; a suite of permanent coronavirus precautions that would have been unthinkable just a few months ago; and the prospect of what Eurasia Group founder Ian Bremmer calls the “Greater Depression” because of its anticipated depth, breadth and length. Against all that, you just want to go back to work at the office. You miss seeing your colleagues and the chance conversations that help solve problems, and even the goodies left in the breakroom. After eight weeks of being “safe at home,” getting back to the workplace sounds good — but don’t bet on it.
A Tennessee Congressman hopes to stop the Tennessee Valley Authority from outsourcing 108 of its IT jobs to foreign companies. “It is incomprehensible that TVA would outsource jobs held by hard-working Americans.”
The social media giant will keep its employees working from home until September. After that it will reopen its ‘warm and welcoming’ offices to those employees who want to, or must, return.
Despite some hurdles, government through remote work is performing better than expected. It will likely lead to permanent changes in everything from labor management and technology to physical footprints.
The coronavirus has revolutionized how Americans work and those changes could be permanent. For many organizations, this coronavirus-caused shift to working from home could be a welcome excuse for change.
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As workers slowly begin returning to work after shelter-in-place orders are lifted, employers will have to make adjustments to ensure worker safety, like new office configurations and more remote workers.
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Forced to work from home due to the COVID-19 pandemic, government agencies are discovering that collaboration on the budget is difficult. What can they do to prepare their budgets remotely and plan for the evolving crisis?
California’s outdated and broken unemployment system has been an issue since the Great Recession. The department is still processing claims but it’s slow and frustrating for officials and residents.
Only public institutions can cope with an emergency like the coronavirus. Despite intensifying budget pressures, we must rebuild the capacity to respond to the needs of the future.
This period of forced remote work has radically changed how many businesses operate. Post pandemic, many companies will likely adapt parts of working remotely to save money and boost employee morale.
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