California workers who have lost their jobs amid coronavirus-linked shutdowns will receive $600 in extra unemployment benefits, starting on Sunday, Gov. Gavin Newsom announced Thursday.
“The state will begin implementing new federal benefit payments of $600 on top of the weekly benefit received by California workers starting this Sunday,” the governor’s office said in a release.
The governor’s office didn’t immediately disclose when the payments would be received by individual workers.
The $600 in additional unemployment benefits was made possible by the federal CARES act signed into law recently by President Donald Trump.
“Many Californians are feeling the effects of this pandemic, and this added benefit is very important to our workers so they have needed resources during this difficult time,” Gov. Newsom said in a prepared release on Thursday.
The extra jobless payment would be in addition to whatever a California worker would normally get from the state’s unemployment program.
“A worker who receives a maximum weekly benefit payment of $450 here in California would collect an additional $600 on top of that,” Loree Levy, a spokesperson for the state’s Employment Development Department said in a recent email to this news organization.
That means an unemployed worker could receive as much as $1,050 a week when the largest state EDD benefits are combined with the enhanced federal payments.
The average state jobless payment in California, as of February, was $340 a week, according to Levy. That would translate to a theoretical average weekly jobless benefit of $940, including the enhanced federal payment.
“I want to thank both our federal partners, as well as everyone in our (state) Labor Agency and the staff in the (state) Employment Development Department, who are working around the clock to ensure California workers have the resources they need to get through this difficult time,” Gov. Newsom said.
