MILWAUKEE- Fresh off of his re-election bid announcement Saturday, Governor Tony Evers says he’s not going to be quick to make changes to the state’s unemployment requirements.
During a Monday morning interview with WTMJ’s Steve Scaffidi, Evers said he didn’t buy into the idea that the three-hundred dollar federal unemployment boost is keeping people from searching for work.
“Our unemployment rate locally is about where it was at pre-pandemic,” Evers said. “I’ll do everything I can, and I know that DWD is, to make sure if people aren’t actively looking [for work], they are getting bumped off unemployment but those numbers aren’t big.”
Last week, Briggs & Stratton CEO Steve Andrews told the Milwaukee Business Journal that his company had nearly 200 open jobs in the Milwaukee area that haven’t been filled because they can’t find workers. Andrews also advocated for the state to end the expanded benefits program.
Evers, during his interview on WTMJ, said he thought the state had a ‘people’ problem, and that’s what is at the center of the workforce issue.
“We have to be a state where people want to come and live,” Evers said. “That was a problem before the pandemic and it’s still one today.”
According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, Wisconsin’s unemployment rate in April was 3.9%. The national unemployment rate was 5.8%.