Unemployed Missourians are expected to look for work after July 4. Is it too soon?

As a call steward for the union that represents stagehands, part of Tyler Miller’s job is to book more than 120 full-time workers for gigs in local venues.

Before COVID-19, Miller often worked 18-hour days calling deep into the union’s roster. This week, he would have been staffing up a Motley Crue concert at Kauffman Stadium, along with concerts at the Sprint Center and the Cable Dahmer Arena in Independence.

But, the phone doesn’t ring much these days. Currently, the International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees Local 31 has three workers hired to install rigging at a renovated Kansas school theater.

The rest have joined the approximately 300,000 requesting unemployment payments in Missouri.

“No one is hiring anybody and they can’t put anyone to work because of COVID,” Miller, 55, said of the live entertainment industry.

Starting July 5, unemployed Missourians who wish to continue receiving benefits will be required to perform and report three work search activities per week. Federal pandemic unemployment benefits, the lion’s share of what each individual receives, are set to expire July 25.

Missouri’s top employment official said during a June 16 press briefing that with the federal payment of $600 per week, state unemployment benefits can exceed the average worker’s weekly wages.

“We all know that a system that rewards individuals to be unemployed is unsustainable,” Anna Hui, Missouri Department of Labor and Industrial Relations director, said. “It is time for employers and workers to have thoughtful and productive conversations on plans and steps that they are taking now to plan on how to return to work.”

Hui also claimed that “several thousand employers” have reportedly offered suitable working conditions to employees who are unwilling to return.

“If an employer offers you suitable work and you are thinking, ‘Well, I can just continue to collect unemployment (payments), that is just not the case here,’” she said.

Despite Hui’s claim of “several thousand,” as of Wednesday just under 1,000 employers have reported that workers are refusing to return, according to the department’s spokesperson Delores Rose.

Far from over

Some may be declining work because their employers have not installed appropriate protections from the virus, according to Richard Von Glahn, policy director for the workers’ rights organization Missouri Jobs for Justice.

Others may be immunocompromised, or live with someone who is at-risk, he added.

The novel coronavirus does not have a cure or a vaccine, and every day researchers are finding out more about the long-term effects on the lungs, kidneys, heart and the brain.

Von Glahn said Missouri Gov. Mike Parson took the correct steps at the beginning of the pandemic in removing job search requirements and expanding unemployment benefits to gig workers and independent contractors.

The pandemic is far from over, though, he said.

“That support needs to remain, and now is not the time to really reinstitute the obstacles to workers and families getting the support they need,” Von Glahn said.

Kansas City is seeing a surge in cases and recently the mayor instituted a face-mask policy for the public while indoors.

Miller, 55, said there are several stagehands much older than him who would be considered at-risk by the Centers for Disease and Control Prevention.

“They are in the realm where COVID would be life-threatening,” Miller said.

The economic status of Diana Lambdin Meyer, a well-established travel writer, and Bruce Meyer, a photographer specializing in sports, changed in mid-March. The Parkville couple went from traveling the world to staying inside.

The novel coronavirus led to the mass cancellation of March Madness events Meyer would have shot, while jobs at the newspaper travel sections and in-flight magazines Lambdin Meyer freelanced for vanished.

“So within a 10-day period we had lost 90 percent of our income,” Lambdin Meyer said. (Lambdin Meyer has written for The Star.)

Beating back feelings of guilt, Meyer, 69, and Lambdin Meyer, 62, decided to receive unemployment benefits for the first time.

Lambdin Meyer still searches for work to no avail. She has thought of working as a cashier at the nearby Price Chopper, but has to weigh the health risks to her and her husband.

“If it gets down to not paying the bills, I’ll put my mask on and go do whatever job is out there.”

Broken, not open

State Sen. John Rizzo, an Independence Democrat, said people should not have to make that choice, at least just yet. Most businesses are managing with minimum staffing and “skeleton crews.”

According to the U.S. Census Small Business Pulse Survey, only 10.4 percent of small businesses that responded had increased their number of employees in the week ending June 20.

The vast majority — about 77.5 percent — did not grow their staff.

“The economy isn’t open, it’s broken,” Rizzo said. “The Department of Labor should not be making it harder for people to get the help they need during a crisis that is far from over, and I implore Governor Parson to do the right thing and put a stop to this harmful plan.”

Bob Bonney, CEO of the Missouri Restaurant Association, cited a June 12 National Restaurant Association poll in which 73% of responding restaurant owners said they have enough willing employees to staff their establishments.

Bonney said employees with offers where conditions are suitable have an obligation to rejoin the workforce.

“Unemployment benefits are available for you when you’re out of work through no fault of your own, and when your employer has work for you, you return to work,” Bonney said.

Business owners are ready to get the cogs of the economy turning again, said Matthew Panik, vice president of government affairs at the Missouri Chamber of Commerce and Industry.

“What we’re seeing from a lot of our members is an eagerness to get the economy back open again, and we want to make sure we can do that safely, first and foremost,” Panik said.

To that end, the chamber published a guide for reopening businesses and is hosting webinars to inform employers about responsible social distancing and screening measures.

The chamber is rallying community support for a special legislative session to address “the growing problem of opportunistic COVID-19 lawsuits” against employers, according to their website.

Panik said that as long as businesses have taken the necessary safety precautions, they shouldn’t be held liable if an employee or customer contracts the virus.

“We basically want to provide safe harbors for businesses from liability related to COVID,” Panik said.

“If they are making sure social distancing is followed — hand-washing, doing everything they can to make a safe work environment — we want to make sure they are protected and feel confident.”

Special session

On Thursday, Parson announced there will be a special legislative session, though he didn’t specify when it would occur. He said lawmakers would “for sure” address liability from COVID-related lawsuits.

Peter Mueser, an economics professor at the University of Missouri, said protecting businesses from liability would do little to coax employees back to the workforce.

“If I had a job where I had to go in, I don’t know what I would do,” said Mueser, who has been working from home since March.

Even if an employee’s work environment is safe, they may have to rely on public transit to get to and from their job, he noted.

“We have to acknowledge that there are risks. We have to acknowledge that there’s work to be done,” Mueser said. “And we also have to acknowledge that the incentive to take those risks for people who are receiving unemployment insurance may be quite minimal.”

It’s Miller’s first time receiving unemployment.

Though he has worked in the theater business since the 1990s, he said he might have to rely on his other skills in the near future. He has a background as a swimming coach (pools are closed), a substitute teacher (schools are closed) and is certified to drive a forklift.

Miller thought it was “unfair” for the government to expect him to look for work when it ordered his industry to shut down. Kansas City only recently lifted capacity limits on businesses, but most entertainment venues have canceled shows for the rest of the summer.

“I don’t know why they are pushing us,” Miller said. “We do want to go to work. But we don’t have an industry.”

This story was originally published June 29, 2020 at 5:00 AM.