Californians do not have to choose between training for a job and getting unemployment benefits. Workers out of a job can take training courses and get training benefits from the California Training Benefits Program.
Planning on accomplishing greater career goals does not have to involve plans to handle difficult periods with low income or no income.
Fit To Work
The Assemblyman who fixed the old rules in 2010 to allow Californians to keep their unemployment insurance and train, Marty Block (D-San Diego), made the change to give every worker an opportunity to hold their own while they train and make their skills and abilities a good match to a job in demand in California. Full opportunities to improve the work commitments a Californian is ready to take is the goal he planned on achieving so all the unemployed can get a job. Avoiding unemployment benefits losses by men and women enrolled in training prevents the state laws from making it easier to pay the bills by dropping out, a choice the legislature found many unemployed made.
Long term unemployment does not have to be a challenge Californians experience.
The California Training Benefits Program
The real opportunities to train and get unemployment benefits is participating in the California Training Benefits Program. Workers that have to train for a new job or retrain for a line of work can get help paying for the courses. The program was set up to help the unemployed.
Eligibility To Get Training Benefits
No one has to be convinced a worker is eligible to train in a program and get benefits. Eligibility is automatic for training on the Employment Development Department ‘s list. The course choice is up to the worker.
No Loss of Benefits
Workers do not have to become a participant and prove their eligibility to get unemployment benefits. Anyone can keep getting them. There is no break in unemployment benefits. Before the law change, Californians experienced breaks in benefits four to eight weeks long during a time the director would decide if a person already enrolled and participating in a training program was eligible to get training benefits. Block’s law made it a guarantee that eligibility for unemployment compensation does not get suspended.
Californians can keep three kinds of benefits income. Unemployment compensation benefits are the main payments out of work Californians count on for an income. Those that stay unemployed past the end of the regular benefits get extended duration benefits and federal unemployment benefits. There is no break in any kind.
Guaranteed Eligibility In Programs
Becoming productive in a job is easy when a Californain choses one of the typical training programs the EDD supports. The EDD trusts the results produced by long time state partners. The Free Trade Acts of 1974 and 2002 set up training benefits for workers put out of a career job by foreign competition or necessary workforce changes that end careers. The typically used programs are the ones a worker can find at a One-Stop Shop that runs the Workforce Investment Act programs and the ones the Employment Training Panel approves. CalWORKS programs also count as ones that make their participants eligible.
There is a list of providers that offer programs called the Eligible Training Provider List.
Union members that are journey level can train for the skilled work their industry demands. They can make their abilities good enough to move up into a new position or train to be able to keep the one they have.
Any Californian in need of training or retraining to improve their work abilities and prevent any job denials because of lack of fitting ability can count on finding a program that can prepare them for a job in demand.
Eligibility Chosen By The Director
If a Californian does not chose one of the programs with guaranteed benefits eligibility they can ask the California director of employment development for an approval on another program. Workers burdened by changes in their labor market that ended their former work and do not have enough opportunity to find a job with the abilities they have can plan on learning a new life of productive work by choosing a training program the director can approve. The director will also take requests for a program approval by workers that lost their job because of seasonal variation in demand in the labor market and do not have other skills they can count on to gain other work.
Enrollment in a college course at a community college or university that can prepare a student for a new line of work is a mark of distinction the director counts in the worker’s favor.
Source:
Retraining Benefits and Unemployment Benefits Act (2010).