New York's Troubled Trust Fund

New York has long operated as a pay-as-you-go system, accumulating no reserves at all, and taking short-term loans from the federal government every year to make it between its large tax paydays each May. During better times, the state managed to pay off its loans most years before interest accumulated, but when the recession struck New York was one of the first states to begin borrowing large sums long-term. Average business taxes will increase from $320 to $349 per worker for 2010, but that most likely won't save the state from having to pay back billions -- or from facing hundreds of millions of dollars worth of interest payments.

This news application is no longer being updated as of February 3, 2011.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

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

All States

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Borrowed Amount Unemployment Rate (November) Net Income (December) Avg. Weekly Benefit % of Unemployed
Receiving Benefits
$3,369.2m 8.2% $-276.9m $309.5 37.0%
National: 9% Rank: 50 of 51 Rank: 21 of 51 Rank: 26 of 51

Unemployment Reserves (millions)

Jan. 2005
July 2005
Jan. 2006
July 2006
Jan. 2007
July 2007
Jan. 2008
July 2008
Jan. 2009
July 2009
Jan. 2010
July 2010
$0.0
$250.0
$500.0
$750.0
$1,000.0
$1,250.0
$1,500.0
Trust Fund Balance (New York is borrowing, Fund is Bankrupt)
Unsustainable

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.