Rick Scott's Florida Unemployment Reform Shortchanges The Jobless: Formal Complaint

Republican Gov. Rick Scott signed a law last year that sharply reduces the duration of benefits and makes filing unemployment claims much more of a hassle. The law requires claims to be filed online, creates a lengthy test with math and reading questions and requires workers to keep detailed records of their job search efforts.

In a formal complaint filed with the U.S. Labor Department, the National Employment Law Project and Florida Legal Services claimed the law shortchanges people who should be eligible for benefits.

"Florida's revised procedures make it just about as difficult as possible for unemployed workers to access unemployment insurance now," said Florida Legal Services attorney Valory Greenfield in a statement. "The effect is that the state is blocking workers from accessing help they are qualified for and twisting the knife in the state’s ailing economy. Nowhere in the country is it this hard to get help when you lose a job."

MaryKay wrote:Another reason we need to be voting and closely following those we vote for. Complete disgust with the system has turned off many of the unemployed but unfortunately, that's exactly what they hoped for. I am not giving up. I hope our members feel the same way.

"Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fired, signifies in the final sense a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and are not clothed.

The world in arms is not spending money alone. It is spending the sweat of its laborers, the genius of its scientists and the hopes of its children."