Meta Brown, Ohio State University

Economists estimate that a minority of eligible US workers claim unemployment insurance in the event of job loss, and that this follows a decades-long decline in UI claiming (Lachowska et al. 2022, O’Leary et al. 2023). This paper uses administrative data from Ohio’s state unemployment insurance system, matched to reports from a leading national credit bureau, to ask whether UI under-claiming is concentrated in younger, middle aged, or older workers. Relying on the mass layoff techniques of Jacobsen et al. (1993) and others, we find that workers in their twenties and sixties draw approximately half as much unemployment insurance as mid-career workers in response to layoffs. If younger workers do not rely on UI benefits, where else do they turn for support through unemployment? Our population-level Ohio credit report data allow us to identify workers’ reliance on consumer lending markets, as well as family connections including shared residence and accounts. Lenders are estimated to be of little help: We find that younger displaced workers actually decrease credit card borrowing in response to job loss and, if displaced in the pandemic, rely little on pandemic lender forbearance. However, family support is clear: we report evidence that less stably attached younger workers move home to elders in response to displacement. Further, we find that the specific young workers who lived with elders before displacement are less than half as likely to draw UI benefits. Finally, we estimate the extent of employment and financial recovery that displaced Ohio workers achieve young workers make the most complete recovery, in terms of employment and earnings, though they suffer persistent credit score declines. Young displaced workers who co-reside with elders are no slower to re-employment but achieve considerably more complete earnings recovery by six quarters after displacement.    

DATE: Friday, February 21, 2025

TIME: 3:30-5:00 p.m.

LOCATION: Fronczak 444