California partial unemployment benefits. (The resource to determine partial unemployment benefits for any state.)

by Anonymous
(California)

I'm a CA state worker who has been furloughed for 2 days a month, which is a reduction of 9.2% in my monthly pay. I can either take the 16 hours (2 eight hour days) during the month or I can bank the time. I'm actually working roughtly a 40 hour week. Would I be eligible for partial unemployment benefits now and/or if the Gov reduces my earnings by another 5% as he is now requesting which would take my total pay cut to almost 15%.



Hi Anonymous,

First, I'm going to refer you to the resource I use to find out how each state calculates Partial Unemployment Benefits.

Click the current year, then "Monetary Eligibility" and go to Table 3-8. (Opens in new window) This information is located at the USDOL and the same table has the information about partial benefits for each state.

You'll notice that California will disregard the first 25 percent of wages you earn in a week before they start reducing your benefit amount dollar for dollar. Common sense tells us that a 15 percent reduction in wage will not be sufficient to qualify for partial benefits.

But California is one of the few states that has a Work Sharing Program. (opens in new window).

A work sharing or short-time compensation program is a voluntary election for an employer.

Instead of determining whether a benefit will be paid based on earnings, a work share program considers reduced hours.

This of course would be helpful to someone in your position, but I can't tell you whether the state will or can make use of the program or if they have some other statute that would apply for public employees.