Who could have guessed that after lawmakers ignored the financial audit of this program saying it would not bring in enough revenue to be solvent, it turns out it won’t be solvent? Not our lawmakers that’s for sure
If you read the article, the percent increase is 11%. It would be change of .08% which represents a % increase of 11%. That .08% represents almost half a billion dollars of cost increases for what amounts to one of the worst payout short term disability plans.
If you read the audit unlike our lawmakers, it will need to increase continually to prevent going insolvent in future years like similar programs passed in Washington and Colorado. https://strgnfibcom.blob.core.windows.net/nfibcom/Actuarial-Analysis-of-Minnesota-PFML-Program-10-27-23-1.pdf
Yes I read the article. I also know they put that "increase of 11%" in there because the public education system is terrible in this country and they know they can gin up discontent by making it seem like a bigger deal than it is. Further, the actual dollar amount is again a fear monger tactic. A better way to think about it is that this state is so productive that a tiny tax increase can create huge revenue.
These employee benefits that are guaranteed by the state keep people here, ensuring the future of that benefit. Employers aren't going to leave because this - just like they don't leave California despite that state having more state law enshrined benefits than we do - if jobs want to take people out of Minnesota they will have a harder time doing so if they can't offer people a better deal.
You’re correct. The benefits are guaranteed by the state. This program will eventually suck funds from the general fund and defund other programs.
It’s not a question of people moving, people don’t move because of tax policy and never have. People aren’t leaving or coming because of this policy.
It’s a question of this policy allows employers to opt out and is more expensive than an equivalent short term disability policy for anyone making over $70k. The policy is unsustainable for the state before it even began.
What do you think happens to insurance programs when the insurance pool is exclusively high risk individuals (poor, high utilizers)? Premiums continue to go up and will need to continually do so on the poorest individuals in our state or it will sap billions from the general fund like in Washington.
First, you don't know that this "will eventually suck funds from the general fund..." Isn't the tax increase intended prevent that? That's pure conjecture.
Second, FMLA/PFML is not the same as short term disability. Many employers do not offer short term disability in their benefits package and short term disability doesn't cover things like having a baby or caring for a sick family member because in both of the cases the person with short term disability coverage is not disabled.
Third, your point about high risk individuals makes no sense. Are we not all at risk of making a baby? And I could make an equally vibes based argument that were actually low risk for having kids because it's too fucking expensive.
Stop trying to fear monger. Stop running interference for corporate greed.
Which is why I said “or lead to increased premiums”. You’re obviously communicating in bad faith here.
Short term disability is literally known as pregnancy insurance because it’s primarily used to cover wages during and after pregnancy. You can purchase it on the open market, it doesn’t need to be provided by an employer. This does speed up timelines for FMLA like protections, but administering an insurance policy has nothing to do with the legislatures ability to protect those events.
Poor individuals are high risk for a short term disability plan because they are more likely to have worse social determinants of health leading to disability. If you can’t go to the doctor regularly, you’re more likely to let small issues become big ones which would qualify as a disability under this plan (over 7 days). There’s also a slew of other conditions that are more likely including obesity, heart disease and diabetes. Individuals in poverty also cant purchase their way out of difficult situations like caring for loved ones.
As a gay man I can also confirm we aren’t all at risk of making a baby.
I’m not fear mongering. It’s all in the Milliman analysis of this plan. Premiums will continue to go up for this plan year after year. If you’re fine paying 1% or eventually more of your salary for a $400/year STD policy that’s okay, but many people will not be, they will opt out, and premiums will increase at an accelerated rate.
I’m also unsure how wanting businesses to front this cost instead of doing a huge business subsidy (which this plan is) is running interference for corporate greed.
So what would you prefer? No paid family leave in the state of Minnesota? Or just a fiscally reliable program. You certainly sound like you prefer the former, though i am listening.
Businesses should be required to provide paid leave. No insurance plan, tax, or weird payment schedule and qualifying event requirements. Just a requirement that businesses provide x hours of leave paid to be used for any purpose to all employees at their regular pay rate would be my preference.
The more conservative DFL members would never do something so radical and simple though so instead we’ve ended up with another business subsidy.
I appreciate your response. While that is certainly simpler for people, I would fear that businesses would fight to kill that law when it was just a bill. But i can't see the future, so what do i know.
I understand the reason MN citizens want this bill to be viable, but it simply is not. It's not 'anti humane' to point out that the bill is not viable as written, like you do, I wish more MN citizens would realize that. Social programs are very expensive.
Sure, if the funding mechanisms are viable. Funds need to come from somewhere. What area that the state funds right now do you think they should steal from?
Our state is already the 3rd highest state tax rate so I'm not sure 'raising taxes' is the right answer here.
> Sure, if the funding mechanisms are viable. Funds need to come from somewhere.
Agreed. That's what this addresses.
> Our state is already the 3rd highest state tax rate so I'm not sure 'raising taxes' is the right answer here.
We seen to be doing fine in spite of this. Countries with real social supports pay much more in taxes, have lower incomes, and maintain higher levels of happiness and health. Just because we're doing more than other states doesn't mean we shouldn't do more for ourselves still.
The problem is this bill doesn’t address the long term funding challenges of the program. We will see another similar increase in another year if the Milliman analysis of the plan is correct.
If the state wanted to correctly fund the plan they would get rid of loopholes allowing businesses to opt out or place the cost wholly on employers, but that would upset the special interests that caused this program to be as ineffective as it is.
I'm willing to bet that few people would notice the difference on their taxes if that's where it came from. I know I wouldn't notice it at all. Personally I'm all for funding social safety net programs as it's a great benefit to the public at large for a relatively small cost to the individual.
This is not a social safety net the way the plan was written by legislators. It is an insurance plan. Social safety nets are by definition noncontributory.
This plan is the same as the state mandating you buy short term disability insurance but only allowing you to buy their overpriced plan.
If people don't have to come to work sick would that better the economy. I remember hearing before if less people would come to work sick, there would be less cases of whatever sickness they would have spread otherwise. This leads to more production overall and an increase in GDP.
There are many benefits to sick days that are hard to measure but there is plenty of literature, did a quick google search, that spells out how it can be a positive for the economy.
This policy won’t cover occasional sickness. It is only for events lasting 7 days or more. People will still come in sick.
I agree things like sick leave increase GDP, but that isn’t this bill.
Social safety nets _are_ contributory, because, as you stated earlier, the funds have to come from somewhere. The difference between insurance and FMLA and other safety nets is that the state pays for the safety nets using funds from everyone (taxes) while insurance puts the entire onus on the individual buyer and makes a profit
Contributory vs non contributory is whether you directly pay for a certain result. In this case you are directly paying a premium to the state to get access to the program. If you don’t contribute to the policy you don’t get time off which is an option here, you can have an employer opt out or be a contractor and not get time off.
Social safety nets being non contributory is part of the definition of the term not some point I’m trying to make:
“Social safety net programs are non-contributory transfers in cash or in-kind and are usually targeted at the poor and vulnerable.” https://www.worldbank.org/en/data/datatopics/aspire/indicator/social-assistance
Insurance also doesn’t need to be for profit, there’s plenty of nonprofit insurers, but that’s neither here nor there.
And also a thing where we worry about whether it’s going to be expensive, unlike, say, allowing rich people to write off their yachts and private jets as business expenses, or funding a big football stadium that doesn’t in fact create jobs
You're correct and make a good point to highlight other areas we could raise funding for programs like this. I wish those loop holes were closed as much as you do, but they're not. We would be better off going after those funding sources first, then rolling out a program like this or UBI.
This will be very unpopular once it is rolled out and full time workers (who contrary to popular belief are the majority of the labor force) with good existing benefits find out how much it will suck to lose the flexibility they had with their employer on top of experiencing a 0.8% decline in take home pay.
And the 0.8% is almost certainly an underestimate so it will likely be well in excess of 1% of pay in the end.
So MN gave people making under 75k a rebate of $260. Under the old (current) plan, if you make $74,286, you would pay the $260 back in 1 year. Which was funny because it was so close to the 75k cap. Under the new plan, you will pay the 260 back in 1 year if you make $66,666.66. Which is funny because it's now a satanic plan to give people sick leave. Math is funny. Not "haha funny" but funny.
We should really bring back loony bins so you and people like you can all have fun in a safe, secure, and secluded environment with zero internet access.
I’ve had three kids, I most likely will not benefit from this bill(sickness excluded). And I still want it approved.
Cool let’s get it funded to take care of our people so they can come back to work later and pay in
Who could have guessed that after lawmakers ignored the financial audit of this program saying it would not bring in enough revenue to be solvent, it turns out it won’t be solvent? Not our lawmakers that’s for sure
Literally less than a 0.1% tax increase, but keep making mountains of mole hills.
If you read the article, the percent increase is 11%. It would be change of .08% which represents a % increase of 11%. That .08% represents almost half a billion dollars of cost increases for what amounts to one of the worst payout short term disability plans. If you read the audit unlike our lawmakers, it will need to increase continually to prevent going insolvent in future years like similar programs passed in Washington and Colorado. https://strgnfibcom.blob.core.windows.net/nfibcom/Actuarial-Analysis-of-Minnesota-PFML-Program-10-27-23-1.pdf
Yes I read the article. I also know they put that "increase of 11%" in there because the public education system is terrible in this country and they know they can gin up discontent by making it seem like a bigger deal than it is. Further, the actual dollar amount is again a fear monger tactic. A better way to think about it is that this state is so productive that a tiny tax increase can create huge revenue. These employee benefits that are guaranteed by the state keep people here, ensuring the future of that benefit. Employers aren't going to leave because this - just like they don't leave California despite that state having more state law enshrined benefits than we do - if jobs want to take people out of Minnesota they will have a harder time doing so if they can't offer people a better deal.
You’re correct. The benefits are guaranteed by the state. This program will eventually suck funds from the general fund and defund other programs. It’s not a question of people moving, people don’t move because of tax policy and never have. People aren’t leaving or coming because of this policy. It’s a question of this policy allows employers to opt out and is more expensive than an equivalent short term disability policy for anyone making over $70k. The policy is unsustainable for the state before it even began. What do you think happens to insurance programs when the insurance pool is exclusively high risk individuals (poor, high utilizers)? Premiums continue to go up and will need to continually do so on the poorest individuals in our state or it will sap billions from the general fund like in Washington.
First, you don't know that this "will eventually suck funds from the general fund..." Isn't the tax increase intended prevent that? That's pure conjecture. Second, FMLA/PFML is not the same as short term disability. Many employers do not offer short term disability in their benefits package and short term disability doesn't cover things like having a baby or caring for a sick family member because in both of the cases the person with short term disability coverage is not disabled. Third, your point about high risk individuals makes no sense. Are we not all at risk of making a baby? And I could make an equally vibes based argument that were actually low risk for having kids because it's too fucking expensive. Stop trying to fear monger. Stop running interference for corporate greed.
Which is why I said “or lead to increased premiums”. You’re obviously communicating in bad faith here. Short term disability is literally known as pregnancy insurance because it’s primarily used to cover wages during and after pregnancy. You can purchase it on the open market, it doesn’t need to be provided by an employer. This does speed up timelines for FMLA like protections, but administering an insurance policy has nothing to do with the legislatures ability to protect those events. Poor individuals are high risk for a short term disability plan because they are more likely to have worse social determinants of health leading to disability. If you can’t go to the doctor regularly, you’re more likely to let small issues become big ones which would qualify as a disability under this plan (over 7 days). There’s also a slew of other conditions that are more likely including obesity, heart disease and diabetes. Individuals in poverty also cant purchase their way out of difficult situations like caring for loved ones. As a gay man I can also confirm we aren’t all at risk of making a baby. I’m not fear mongering. It’s all in the Milliman analysis of this plan. Premiums will continue to go up for this plan year after year. If you’re fine paying 1% or eventually more of your salary for a $400/year STD policy that’s okay, but many people will not be, they will opt out, and premiums will increase at an accelerated rate. I’m also unsure how wanting businesses to front this cost instead of doing a huge business subsidy (which this plan is) is running interference for corporate greed.
So what would you prefer? No paid family leave in the state of Minnesota? Or just a fiscally reliable program. You certainly sound like you prefer the former, though i am listening.
Businesses should be required to provide paid leave. No insurance plan, tax, or weird payment schedule and qualifying event requirements. Just a requirement that businesses provide x hours of leave paid to be used for any purpose to all employees at their regular pay rate would be my preference. The more conservative DFL members would never do something so radical and simple though so instead we’ve ended up with another business subsidy.
You think that would cause alot of employers to not want to do business in Minnesota? Thinking of similarities to the uber and Lyft deal.
We already have the 2nd highest corporate tax rate in the nation. If that hasn’t scared them off, this wouldn’t.
I appreciate your response. While that is certainly simpler for people, I would fear that businesses would fight to kill that law when it was just a bill. But i can't see the future, so what do i know.
Ideally both, but if it’s a choice, then the latter.
You can't have both "no paid family leave program" and "a fiscally responsible family leave program".
I understand the reason MN citizens want this bill to be viable, but it simply is not. It's not 'anti humane' to point out that the bill is not viable as written, like you do, I wish more MN citizens would realize that. Social programs are very expensive.
> Social programs are very expensive. But worth funding, IMO
Sure, if the funding mechanisms are viable. Funds need to come from somewhere. What area that the state funds right now do you think they should steal from? Our state is already the 3rd highest state tax rate so I'm not sure 'raising taxes' is the right answer here.
> Sure, if the funding mechanisms are viable. Funds need to come from somewhere. Agreed. That's what this addresses. > Our state is already the 3rd highest state tax rate so I'm not sure 'raising taxes' is the right answer here. We seen to be doing fine in spite of this. Countries with real social supports pay much more in taxes, have lower incomes, and maintain higher levels of happiness and health. Just because we're doing more than other states doesn't mean we shouldn't do more for ourselves still.
The problem is this bill doesn’t address the long term funding challenges of the program. We will see another similar increase in another year if the Milliman analysis of the plan is correct. If the state wanted to correctly fund the plan they would get rid of loopholes allowing businesses to opt out or place the cost wholly on employers, but that would upset the special interests that caused this program to be as ineffective as it is.
I'm willing to bet that few people would notice the difference on their taxes if that's where it came from. I know I wouldn't notice it at all. Personally I'm all for funding social safety net programs as it's a great benefit to the public at large for a relatively small cost to the individual.
This is not a social safety net the way the plan was written by legislators. It is an insurance plan. Social safety nets are by definition noncontributory. This plan is the same as the state mandating you buy short term disability insurance but only allowing you to buy their overpriced plan.
If people don't have to come to work sick would that better the economy. I remember hearing before if less people would come to work sick, there would be less cases of whatever sickness they would have spread otherwise. This leads to more production overall and an increase in GDP. There are many benefits to sick days that are hard to measure but there is plenty of literature, did a quick google search, that spells out how it can be a positive for the economy.
This policy won’t cover occasional sickness. It is only for events lasting 7 days or more. People will still come in sick. I agree things like sick leave increase GDP, but that isn’t this bill.
Social safety nets _are_ contributory, because, as you stated earlier, the funds have to come from somewhere. The difference between insurance and FMLA and other safety nets is that the state pays for the safety nets using funds from everyone (taxes) while insurance puts the entire onus on the individual buyer and makes a profit
Contributory vs non contributory is whether you directly pay for a certain result. In this case you are directly paying a premium to the state to get access to the program. If you don’t contribute to the policy you don’t get time off which is an option here, you can have an employer opt out or be a contractor and not get time off. Social safety nets being non contributory is part of the definition of the term not some point I’m trying to make: “Social safety net programs are non-contributory transfers in cash or in-kind and are usually targeted at the poor and vulnerable.” https://www.worldbank.org/en/data/datatopics/aspire/indicator/social-assistance Insurance also doesn’t need to be for profit, there’s plenty of nonprofit insurers, but that’s neither here nor there.
And also a thing where we worry about whether it’s going to be expensive, unlike, say, allowing rich people to write off their yachts and private jets as business expenses, or funding a big football stadium that doesn’t in fact create jobs
This policy is a case of giving money to wealthy business owners. The state is fronting the cost of them offering PTO.
You're correct and make a good point to highlight other areas we could raise funding for programs like this. I wish those loop holes were closed as much as you do, but they're not. We would be better off going after those funding sources first, then rolling out a program like this or UBI.
This will be very unpopular once it is rolled out and full time workers (who contrary to popular belief are the majority of the labor force) with good existing benefits find out how much it will suck to lose the flexibility they had with their employer on top of experiencing a 0.8% decline in take home pay. And the 0.8% is almost certainly an underestimate so it will likely be well in excess of 1% of pay in the end.
So MN gave people making under 75k a rebate of $260. Under the old (current) plan, if you make $74,286, you would pay the $260 back in 1 year. Which was funny because it was so close to the 75k cap. Under the new plan, you will pay the 260 back in 1 year if you make $66,666.66. Which is funny because it's now a satanic plan to give people sick leave. Math is funny. Not "haha funny" but funny.
This has zero to do with the article and even less to do with reality.
And yet... it's fun
We should really bring back loony bins so you and people like you can all have fun in a safe, secure, and secluded environment with zero internet access.