Guaranteed Employment Plans

Abstract

The mere mention of is likely to excite widespread interest and support from those persons and groups who desire, through the enactment of state compensation laws, to prevent as well as to alleviate its effects. The very term guaranteed employment connotes an advance security which is not implied in connection with the standard (unemployment benefit) provisions of state laws. Since plans call for an advance guaranty of for a minimum number of hours per week and for a stated number of weeks per year, such plans immediately appeal as job assurance in contrast to unemployment insurance. It is apparently with the purpose of providing for this socially attractive option that the Wisconsin, California, and Oregon laws contain provisions permitting plans.' Employer interest in such plans may be explained on two grounds, either of which may, depending on individual circumstances, play the dominant role: (i) Some employers will select plans out of a definite desire to undertake a greater responsibility to their employees than is ordinarily required. Many such employers are, however, not unmindful of the fact that their picture is already such, by the nature of their business, that will not prove particularly costly. (2) The merit rating assured by such plans may induce a few less stable employers to undertake the plan, but as a rule, only where alternative merit-rating plans are not available.