Gov. Gretchen Whitmer signed bills Monday that will expand unemployment benefits for people who are out of work.

Over three years, the maximum benefit will increase from $362 per-week to $614 weekly. Also, the maximum time period to collect benefits would increase to 26 weeks from 20 weeks.

“With winter just around corner, Michiganders are still juggling high costs and a competitive job market,” Whitmer said in a statement released by her office. “These bills will put money back in people’s pockets so they can keep a roof over their heads, pay the bills, get a good-paying job, and put food on the table.”  

Whitmer said Michigan is one of just a dozen states that offer unemployment benefits that are capped at less than 26 weeks.

Then-Governor Rick Snyder and the Republican-led Legislature rolled back the cap to 20 weeks in 2011, and business groups say this will encourage more people to delay returning to work during a worker shortage. This legislation would not likely have gotten to Whitmer’s desk after this term as Republicans will take control of the House next year.

Michigan AFL-CIO President Ron Bieber cheered the new laws.

“This victory for working people has been over a decade in the making,” he said in a statement released by the governor’s office. “… Finally, Michigan’s unemployment benefits will be restored to full strength after years of lagging behind our midwestern neighbors and practically every other state in the country.”

Business groups that did not support the legislation said they are concerned about the impact of the benefits expansion.

Small Business Association of Michigan President Brian Calley – who was Snyder’s lieutenant governor when the benefits rollback was signed – said an emergency order extending benefits during COVID-19 had the unintended effect of keeping people out of work longer then necessary.

“The extended higher unemployment level made it much more possible for jobs to go unfilled for longer periods of time,” he told Michigan Public Radio. “So, there is some concern, and we will be watching labor force participation very closely.”

Calley said he also would have preferred to see a longer recovery period for the trust fund that finances unemployment benefits. Employers pay into the trust fund. Calley said he also would have liked to see the Michigan Unemployment Insurance Agency complete a technology upgrade before a decision was made to increase benefits.

Michigan residents could see their unemployment benefits grow under bills that passed the state Senate Thursday.

The legislation would extend the amount of time someone can claim unemployment benefits to up to 26 weeks in a year. That’s six weeks more than what’s currently available to Michigan residents.

Over the next three years, the legislation would also gradually raise the maximum amount someone could receive.

State Senator John Cherry (D-Flint) said it’s been too long since those numbers have seen an update.

“We are extremely low. If you look at like the we are below federal poverty rate. So that’s a tough situation for people to be at. If they lose their job for two months before they get a new one, being able to make sure they’re providing food for their kids and all that,” Cherry said.

Some business groups are criticizing the legislation as raising costs for employers.

In a statement, the Michigan Manufacturers Association called the legislation a “dramatic increase.”

“Increasing the weekly maximum benefit with an undefined cost to Michigan job providers is irresponsible and will threaten the state’s competitiveness compared to neighboring states. In addition, this large increase will threaten the solvency of Michigan’s Unemployment Insurance Trust Fund which will trigger even higher tax increases placed upon the backs of employers. Michigan manufacturers will be facing a powerful disadvantage,” MMA Director of Employment Policy David Worthams said in a press release.

Other bills in the package would require the state to take more steps before reclaiming unemployment benefits that may have been wrongly paid.

They’re part of an attempt to improve the unemployment filing experience and cut back on the state wrongly accusing people of fraud.

“Government’s done great work on nailing down fraud. But we’ve seen settlements, court settlements in which the department has had to pay millions upon millions of dollars to folks who were falsely accused of fraud. And this helps make sure that that those folks are not getting caught up in the system,” Cherry said.

But Senate Minority Leader Aric Nesbitt (R-Porter Twp) said lawmakers should focus on other issues with the state’s unemployment system instead, like fraudulent claims and delays in checks going out.

“There’s huge problems at the Unemployment Insurance Agency, what they passed today doesn’t do anything, doesn’t fix the problems that’s there,” he said.

The legislation would still need to make it past the Michigan House and receive the governor’s signature to become law.

Michigan’s jobless rate ticked up to 4.5% in August, the third month in a row the state unemployment rate has registered a slight increase.

Non-farm payroll jobs dropped by roughly 2,000 in August — a small number compared to a total job count of 4,488,000. Payroll jobs declined by 19,000 over the past three months.

Michigan Bureau of Labor Information Director Wayne Rourke said the state’s job market appears to be settling into more normal patterns after steep losses during the COVID-19 pandemic followed by big job gains and a strong recovery.                

”Everything we’re seeing is pretty incremental,” he told the Michigan Public Radio Network. “There’s not any massive movement in any particular industry that would tell a big story, but we are seeing a general softening in the last few months.”                

Rourke also said a look at the year-to-year data shows the overall state and national job trends are similar even though the U.S. as a whole showed a small boost last month.

“Over the year, Michigan’s unemployment rate is up half a percentage point while the U.S. is up four-tenths of a percentage point,” he said. “So, the trends are really similar and what we’re seeing here is what’s happening nationwide as well.”