STATE OF WISCONSIN
LABOR AND INDUSTRY REVIEW COMMISSION
P O BOX 8126, MADISON, WI 53708-8126 (608/266-9850)


CHAD J SEVERSON, Claimant

TRADE ACT DECISION
Hearing No. 99004205LX


An administrative law judge (ALJ) for the Division of Unemployment Insurance of the Department of Workforce Development issued a decision in this matter. A timely petition for review was filed.

The commission has considered the petition and the positions of the parties, and it has reviewed the evidence submitted to the ALJ. Based on its review, the commission agrees with the decision of the ALJ, and it adopts the findings and conclusion in that decision as its own.

DECISION

The decision of the administrative law judge is affirmed. Accordingly, the claimant is potentially eligible for TRA allowances, at the weekly benefit rate of $176, as more specifically set forth in the determination.

Dated and mailed February 9, 2000
severch.tsd : 110 : 

/s/ David B. Falstad, Chairman

/s/ Pamela I. Anderson, Commissioner

/s/ James A. Rutkowski, Commissioner


MEMORANDUM OPINION

This case concerns claimant Chad J. Severson's challenge to the weekly rate which was determined to be applicable in connection with the his entitlement to TRA benefits. (1)

A determination was issued in July, 1999 which found that the weekly rate which would be applicable for claimant's TRA benefits should be $297. However, that determination was subsequently amended by another determination which was issued in October, 1999. That amended determination stated that it was amending the earlier determination to show the corrected amount of the weekly TRA benefit entitlement, which was $176.

The claimant appealed the October, 1999 amended determination, and following a hearing it was affirmed by an administrative law judge. The claimant has petitioned for commission review of that decision.

In his petition for review, the claimant states:

"According to the conclusions of law, the weekly benefit allowances for TRA benefits are calculated in the same manner as regular state unemployment benefits. If the TRA would be calculated on my first eligible month (August 1998), I would have received full TRA benefits like the determination in July 1999 was approved for. My week lay-off in January 1998 was a normal slow time in all brewing companies."

What the administrative law judge was referring to when she said that the weekly benefit allowances for TRA benefits are calculated in the same manner as regular state unemployment benefits, was the fact that under the Trade Act, the trade readjustment allowance payable to an adversely affected worker for a week of total unemployment shall be an amount equal to

"the most recent weekly benefit amount of the unemployment insurance payable to the worker for a week of total unemployment preceding the worker's first exhaustion of unemployment insurance".

19 U.S.C. § 2292 (a).

At first glance, this may seem to dictate that the most recent weekly benefit amount for unemployment should be used, but that is not correct. As the language of the law indicates, the rate which governs is the most recent weekly benefit amount of the unemployment insurance payable to the worker for a week of total unemployment preceding the worker's first exhaustion of unemployment insurance. That means, that the rate which governs is the weekly benefit amount of the unemployment insurance payable to the worker during the first unemployment insurance benefit year prior to the point at which they will begin to be eligible to receive the TRA benefits upon exhaustion of their unemployment benefits. The purpose of this is, that when TRA benefits begin upon the exhaustion of a claimant's entitlement to unemployment benefits, they are paid at the same rate that the claimant had been receiving in unemployment benefits before the entitlement was exhausted.

The determination of this rate is to be made as of the point at which the claimant first acquires legal entitlement to benefits under the Trade Act; this occurs when an individual loses his or her job with a business which has been determined to have been adversely affected by foreign competition. In claimant's case, this occurred when he was laid off from Stroh Brewery in August, 1998, in connection with its eventual closing. At that point, the most recent weekly benefit amount of the unemployment insurance payable to the claimant for weeks of total unemployment was $176. (2)     Because that was the most recent weekly benefit amount of unemployment benefits, as of that point in August, 1998 when claimant became potentially eligible for TRA benefits, it was the amount that was properly determined to be the applicable weekly benefit amount for TRA benefits.

The claimant is in effect asking, that a different method be used to determine his applicable TRA benefit rate: that a weekly benefit rate be re-computed as of August, 1998, based on a different and more recent set of "base year" calendar quarters than had been used when his weekly rate for unemployment purposes had been computed in January, 1998.

The commission appreciates, that if this different method were used for determining the applicable rate for TRA benefits for claimant, his benefit rate would be higher. However, the method which was used, was the one required by federal law. The commission simply has no authority to use a different method of computing the weekly rate applicable to claimant's TRA entitlement. For these reasons, the decision of the administrative law judge must be affirmed.


[Related commission decision - Chad J. Severson, Hrg. No. 99004206]

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Footnotes:

(1)( Back ) TRA benefits - "Trade Readjustment Allowances" -- are weekly benefits payable under the Trade Act of 1974, 19 U.S.C. § 2101 et seq., a federal law intended to ameliorate the effects on workers from foreign competition which adversely affects businesses here in the U.S.

(2)( Back ) That rate had been set when he initiated his claim for unemployment benefits in early 1998 (in connection with a 1- week seasonal layoff), based on certain past calendar quarters which constituted his "base year" as of that point.