The major ingredients of enlightened public policy include foresight, expertise, balance, trust, empathy, political acumen and mitigating unintended consequences. Putting all this together in a democracy of 330 million people during a time of medical and economic national emergency is a real challenge.
But it is doable, if politicians and administrators work together for the benefit of all constituents and put aside petty ideological differences.
This might be happening in the Coronavirus legislation passed recently by Congress.
HR 6074 dealt with medical funding and was supported by all North Carolina members of Congress.
HR 6201 – which deals with the economic impacts of the Coronavirus – passed the House of Representatives.
We could say a lot about Congress and its recent behavior, but that is not important at this time. What is important is the impact on Graham County hourly workers, their families and the many small businesses that employ them. On a national level, 25 percent of workers don’t earn a paycheck if they miss work for any reason. In Graham County, this percent is most likely much higher.
HR 6201 – known as the “Families First Act” – deals with the many economic problems created for hourly workers by a total lack of benefits, closings of schools and a lack of alternate means to take care of children, shutdowns of events and facilities to contain the virus, and an appalling slowness of implementing early medically advisable actions that have become missed opportunities to contain the contagion.
Under the proposed legislation, employers must provide up to 14 days of paid sick leave to people who cannot work due to the virus or having to take care of family members.
The devil is in the details on this provision, because there is an exception for businesses with under 50 employees, if approved by the U.S. Department of Labor.
I suspect most of our small businesses in Graham County have less than 50 employees and can’t afford the cost of benefits or don’t want their employees to get a taste of receiving the benefits.
Should the 50-employee exception remain in the bill, our local officials need to immediately set up a process to help small businesses do the right thing and pay the sick leave, help employees prove they qualify for the wages and assist small businesses in obtaining the administration’s impact funding.
Unemployment insurance funding will be increased for those who are out of work due to the economic impacts, but don’t qualify for sick leave.
While these payments don’t put a lot of food on the table, the excuse that state unemployment trust funds have been exhausted is taken away. Food stamps work requirements will be temporarily waived – which is fair, since there may be no work.
Medicaid cost federal shares will be increased from 60 percent to 66 percent and finally, interest on college loans will be waived during the crisis.
Payment will continue, but for principal only. Sounds kinda Bernie-ish to me.
For this legislation to help the people of Graham County, we need a process to deal with the 50-employee exception. Not doing this will negate most of the benefits for our many Graham County hourly workers.
Even with this concern, good news is good news. Congress and the President are working together to solve the Coronavirus challenge.
Party ideology is being suppressed to some degree.
Perhaps a quote attributed to Winston Churchill describes the situation: “Americans will always do the right thing - after they have exhausted all the other possibilities.”
Roger Carlton is a columnist for The Graham Star.