California Owes $55 Billion on Unemployment Benefits | Will Swaim

California Insider

“In the COVID era people ended up on unemployment and the federal government send out about $100 billion to California and a huge amount of it, about $55 billion, was lost to criminal gang. Fraudster show up from all over the world. We’re talking about international crime, gangs, people in California prisons and jails.”

Siyamak sits down with William Swain, the president of the California Policy Center. We'll discuss how California now has about $55 billion in unemployment benefit liabilities, of which a significant amount was due to EDD fraud during the pandemic, the biggest fraud of its kind in any state. Now, California businesses are liable to cover these costs.

“They’re not just going to eat that out of their profit these businesses, they’re going to raise their prices. You wouldn’t know a whole lot about this because the business community itself is really hesitant to raise objection or afraid that if they do the regulator’s will descend on them and find something wrong with their business.”

*Views expressed in this video/article are opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of California Insider.