Colorado's Troubled Trust Fund

A low unemployment rate helped Colorado sustain relatively low taxes and high benefits, but a sharp increase in claims in 2009 ate through most of the state's reserves. An average tax increase for businesses from $163 to $236 per worker is in effect for 2010, but that likely won't be enough to help the state avoid more borrowing.

This news application is no longer being updated as of February 3, 2011. The historical data is still accurate.

  Bankrupt and Borrowing: Colorado's unemployment fund is currently bankrupt and Colorado is borrowing from the federal government.

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Borrowed Amount Unemployment Rate (November) Net Income (December) Avg. Weekly Benefit % of Unemployed
Receiving Benefits
$483.3m 8.7% $-57.8m $350.6 37.0%
National: 9% Rank: 37 of 51 Rank: 7 of 51 Rank: 27 of 51

Unemployment Reserves (millions)

Reporters: You are free to use this data to report your stories. Just remember to credit Propublica. Here's a CSV Download of our unemployment data. (Last update February 02, 2011)

Sources: Google Public Data, Department of Labor, Treasury Department.