Legally Required Benefits
Origins of Legally Required Benefits
➢ Established to protect individuals from catastrophic events
▪ Disability
▪ Unemployment
➢ Protection programs to:
▪ Promote worker safety and health
▪ Maintain family income streams
▪ Assist families in crisis
▪ Enable retirees to maintain subsistence income levels
▪
➢ Provided a form of social insurance
➢ Reasons for implementation
▪ Rapid growth of industrialization in early 1900s
▪ Hardships caused by the Great Depression in the 1930s
Four Categories of
Legally Required Benefits
➢ Social Security Programs
▪ Unemployment insurance
▪ Old Age, Survivor, and Disability Insurance (OASDI)
▪ Medicare
➢ Workers’ Compensation
➢ Family and Medical Leave
➢ Health insurance
Unemployment Insurance
➢ Temporary income for spells of unemployment that result through no fault of the
employee
➢ An employee who is terminated for cause (ex. poor performance) does not qualify
➢ An employee who is terminated as part of a company layoff is eligible
Unemployment Insurance Eligibility
➢ Able and available for work
➢ Actively seeking work
➢ Has not refused suitable work
➢ Must be employed for the last four or five quarters prior to becoming unemployed,
known as the base period
OASDI
➢ Old Age, Survivor, and Disability Insurance (OASDI)
➢ Enacted in 1935 for retirement insurance
➢ Survivors’ insurance added in 1939
➢ Disability insurance added in 1965
OASDI Survivor’s Benefits
➢ Based on Eligibility Status and Relationship
▪ Deceased was fully insured
