How will the Unemployment Insurance contribution rate schedule change in 2011?
In response to significant declines in the balance in the state’s unemployment insurance Trust Fund and the dramatic rise in the value of outstanding loans from the federal government to cover unemployment benefit payments, the South Carolina Legislature passed significant reforms to the unemployment tax rate system. The new system is designed to limit further federal borrowing, repay outstanding loans and interest, and rebuild the trust fund to an acceptable level. The state will no longer operate with a fixed tax rate table or reserve ratios. The new experience rating system will be based on benefit ratios and the tax rates will be set each year so that they generate the desired level of funding for a given year. The new structure places employers into one of twenty tax rates based on benefit ratios. Based on taxable wages, 5% of employers with the lowest benefit ratios will be placed into the lowest tax rate, category one. The remaining employers will be arrayed into the remaining n
