Assistance program
Unemployment Insurance
$37.1 Billion committed in FY2018–FY2026
- Agency
- Employment and Training Administration, Labor, Department of
- Assistance
- Formula Grants;Direct Payments With Unrestricted Use
- CFDA number
- 17.225
- What it does
- To implement and oversee unemployment insurance programs for eligible workers through federal and state cooperation; including unemployment compensation for federal employees or ex-service members, Disaster Unemployment Assistance, and to assist in the oversight of Trade Adjustment Assistance and Alternative Trade Adjustment Assistance, Reemployment Trade Adjustment Assistance programs, and temporary UI programs enacted in times of economic shocks or downturns.
- Who benefits
- All workers whose wages are subject to state unemployment insurance laws, federal civilian employees, ex-service members, and workers whose unemployment is caused by a presidentially declared disaster under the Robert T. Stafford Disaster Relief and Emergency Assistance Act or pandemic under the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (CARES) Act of 2020, as amended, are eligible if they meet the qualification and eligibility requirements of the relevant unemployment compensation program. For regular unemployment compensation (UC), UCFE, UCX, EB, and PEUC claims this generally means that the individual is involuntarily unemployed, able to work, available for work, meets the eligibility and qualifying requirements of the state law, and are free from disqualifications. For PUA claims, the individual must self-certify that they are otherwise able to work and available for work within the meaning of applicable state law except that they are unemployed, partially unemployed, or unable or unavailable to work for COVID-19 related reason(s) identified in Section 2102 of the CARES Act and Department guidance. Some states provide Short Time Compensation or Self Employment Assistance for eligible individuals. Workers who became unemployed or underemployed because of the adverse effect of increased imports or because of shifts in production outside the U.S. may be eligible for Trade Readjustment Allowance, Alternative Trade Adjustment Assistance or Reemployment Adjustment Assistance and other types of Trade Adjustment Assistance (see program 57.001). Individual state information on eligibility requirements is available from local American Job Centers or at https://www.careeronestop.org/LocalHelp/service-locator.aspx. Temporary UI programs may target other categories of workers.
- Who applies
- U.S. Territories and possessions, state workforce agencies, including those in the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico and Virgin Islands. The Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act (WIOA) (Pub. L. 113-128) was passed on July 22, 2014. It supersedes titles I and II of the Workforce Investment Act of 1998, and amends the Wagner-Peyser Act and the Rehabilitation Act of 1973. The law went into effect on July 1, 2015. Also, unless otherwise stipulated, recipients are subject to Uniform Administrative Requirements, Cost Principles, and Audit Requirements for Federal Awards; Final Rule on December 26, 2013, and found at 2 CFR Part 200 along with the OMB approved exceptions for DOL at 2 CFR Part 2900 published on December 19, 2014, in the Federal Register.
- Authorized by
- Unemployment Compensation for Ex-Servicemembers
- Federal Unemployment Tax Act
- The Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act (WIOA) (Pub. L. 113-128) was passed on July 22, 2014. It supersedes titles I and II of the Workforce Investment Act of 1998, and amends the Wagner-Peyser Act and the Rehabilitation Act of 1973. The law went into effect on July 1, 2015.…
- Social Security Act (Titles III, IX, XI, XII) 42 USC 501-504; 1101-1110; 1320b-7; 1321-1324
- Federal-State Extended Unemployment Compensation Act
- Unemployment Compensation for Federal Civilian Employees
- Robert T. Stafford Disaster Relief and Emergency Assistance Act
- Program site
- http://ows.doleta.gov/unemploy/ ↗
Committed by fiscal year
* FY2026 is year-to-date — the fiscal year is still in progress, so its total is still filling in. The striped band and dashed line mark that provisional stretch.
How the money flows
Committed dollars by how this program's money is paid out.
Direct payments
$999.3M
3%
Grants
$36.1B
97%
Top recipients
By dollars committed.
How to read these numbers
- Committed through this program
Money committed under this assistance listing (its CFDA program), counted in the year each action happened.
- How it's paid
Most programs pay out one way — a grant, or a direct payment to individuals; the flow bar only appears when a program genuinely mixes types.
- Some recipients aren't itemized
For entitlement programs like Social Security and Medicare, the government reports one aggregate instead of naming tens of millions of people, so the recipient roster isn't part of the public record.
- Awards, counted once
An award count is the number of distinct awards with at least one action that year — each counted once, however many times it was amended.
- The colored bars
Every bar on this page splits by how the money moves:
Direct payments