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California has made it easer for same-sex partners to obtain unemployment benefits, should one person have to relocate to live with another.
Previously, only heterosexual couples who've uprooted their lives – and therefore quit their jobs – to be together were allowed unemployment benefits. But now, as marriage equality continues to be bound by red tape in the state, those registered as domestic partners will have access to the program.
The California Communities United Institute explains:
AB 2055 would provide this unemployment insurance benefit to same sex couples under the following circumstances:
1. They plan to register as domestic partners soon.
2. The partner who quits a job (the claimant) must show that it would be too far to commute to his or her job from where the couple plan to live.
3. The claimant must show that he or she asked and was refused a job transfer with the same employer to a job within commuting distance from where the couple intend to live.
This is a valuable feature of the Unemployment Insurance program in California. It reduces the economic burden on newlyweds when one of them must quit a job in order to move to the city of his or her intended spouse. It can have the same benefit for same sex couples who register as domestic partners.
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