Florida's jobless benefits' computer programming based on 1972 technology.

[madfloridian]

No wonder things are moving slowly in getting those benefits out to people in this state with 9.4 percentage points unemployment. The computer system is old and creaking, ready to fail. Of course that doesn't explain the long waits by phone, but that's another story.

From the Orlando Sentinel:

Florida jobless-benefits computer at 'increasing risk of ... failure'

The state's $2.2 billion unemployment insurance program — a safety net crucial to the welfare of jobless Floridians — relies on 35-year-old computer technology that is antiquated, "well beyond its useful life" and at an "ever increasing risk of ... failure," according to documents obtained by the Orlando Sentinel.

The mainframe computer, installed in 1972, is "inherently rigid and difficult to maintain" and costs the state tens of millions of dollars in unemployment overpayments and staff time, says a report by the Agency for Workforce Innovation, which runs the unemployment program.

The system acts as a "roadblock" to getting people back to work and became so unstable last summer that consultants raised the specter of system collapse. That "would be catastrophic to individuals, their families and to the broader Florida economy," said the report, obtained through a public-records request.

"While predicting exactly when the system will fail is not possible, the system has been showing signs of stress for some time," says the feasibility study on replacing the Nixon-era hardware. "It is evident that the system can no longer keep pace with the needs of the (unemployment compensation) program."

Adding to the stress from the slow state response...is the fact that the Republicans may not accept the unemployment part of the stimulus.

From March:

Florida Republicans might reject stimulus cash for jobless.

Florida is on the verge of forfeiting more than $1 billion in federal stimulus funds that could help 250,000 Floridians whose unemployment benefits are running out.

The problem: The federal offer for aid comes at a price that many in the state Legislature are unwilling to pay. To receive the money, the state would have to pass a new law widening the pool of people receiving extended unemployment benefits. So far, no legislation has been introduced. The federal government would pick up most of the estimated $776 million cost of providing the extended benefits through December 2009.

Verified again this week that they will reject at least part of the jobless stimulus.

Florida lawmakers will likely reject about $440 million in additional workers' compensation benefits

While Republican Gov. Charlie Crist warmly embraced the Democratic spending plan, some Republican state House members suggested they might refuse some of the money. In the end, the Legislature will likely reject about $440 million in additional workers' compensation benefits that could trigger a higher tax on businesses.

Lawmakers will take the remaining $13 billion.

''We have to spend what we have,'' said Rep. Bill Galvano, a Bradenton Republican. ``Most of us are beyond the philosophical questions at this point.''

A computer system that dates back to 1972, and a punitive mindset toward the unemployed by the GOP...a heck of a combination.

[Taverner]

1. Of course! The last thing the GOP wants is working people

They want us all unemployed, hungry and desperate

That way we work for $2 a day without complaining.

Reading assignment: The Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck

[sinkingfeeling]

2. It's a State of Fla. system. Florida has never been known for putting out money. When I lived there

for 20 months in 1977-1978, they refused to build schools and I put my son in a private school.

[madfloridian]

11. Well, Jeb's gonna fix the school system. Add more testing.

He's still apparently in charge here.

Jeb says add more testing, make the tests harder, and make more charter schools

[madrchsod]

3. the 370 IBM...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/System/370

[madfloridian]

5. And it was amazing for its time.

Looking back seems a dinosaur. Check out the hairdo. :-)

[Ezlivin]

8. And those people in the photo are STILL working in Florida's government

As soon as they can reboot that computer and find a blank tape, they'll be ready to meet the needs of antediluvian Florida.

[backscatter712]

15. Are they still using the 30-30 "Winchester" drives?

That's 30 megabytes fixed in the drive, 30 megabytes in a huge removable cartridge, and the drive resembles a washing machine that's always on spin-cycle.

[sinkingfeeling]

26. A 370 is about 920 times slower than a new Z10, but one could actually run the same program on the

newest mainframe. S/370 Model 158-3 equal 1 MIPS. Z10 64-way equal 920 MIPS.

[Deja Q]

4. If it ain't broke, don't fix it (or indeed break it so it needs fixing.)

:evilgrin:

[Dr.Phool]

6. I think my wife learned on one of these in college.

[madfloridian]

7. Giving my age away...

A couple of years long time ago they sent Tandy (not sure of the model) computers home with teachers for the summer so we could get the feel of them. A college offered courses in programming and working on them. Very limited options. I believe it was in the 70s

[FloridaJudy]

9. As a former Florida state employee

I'm not in the least surprised.

I'm not all that tech savy, but even I could tell the programs they were using were dinosaurs.

Sadly, I expect that hasn't changed much. Oh, maybe by now they've upgraded to DOS 3.3...and that's not much of an exaggeration.

[madfloridian]

12. They have been too busy privatizing services to worry about infrastructure.

That has been my fear all along.

[FloridaJudy]

16. Even the privatized programs

Like the Orwellian named 'People First' was using a computer program that was mind-bogglingly primitive. Developed by one of Jeb's cronies, it was kludged together and completely un-user friendly. I took one look at it and remarked 'Umm..folks..I think security is going to be a problem...' But, hell, I'm a nurse - what would I know about computers?

Took less than a week for it to get hacked, and it had all our information on it - including social security numbers and bank account numbers. Fortunately, it was a inside job, and the hacker wasn't very skilled so they caught him before it was even more of a mess.

Yeah. Privatization worked really well for Florida.

[madfloridian]

17. That's terrible. Leaving government records so vulnerable.

And I don't remember much publicity about any of it. The media in Florida has so far been Jeb, George, and Republican friendly.

[FloridaJudy]

21. It was unbelievably idiotic

When you demand that all your employees enter all their financial information into a system, you'd damned well better make sure you have a good firewall, secure encryption and a strong password system. They required our passwords to be a seven-digit number - no letters or symbols allowed. You don't have to be a mathematical genius to figure out that's the easiest type of password to crack, nor a psychology major to realize a whole bunch of employees are going to use their phone numbers because they're easy to remember - we still have people who think 'password' is a cute password...

Bloody thing was a cyber-criminal's wet dream.

[madfloridian]

10. Add to the woes...they are asking people to apply online

since phone lines are so overworked and unmanned.

http://www.miamiherald.com/news/southflorida/story/996045.html

"AWI wants more people to apply for benefits online at www.floridajobs.org. The agency says it handled 1.3 million jobless claims in 2008, twice as many as in 2007, and will soon spend up to $6.25 million in federal funds for a private call center company to manage overflow calls.

The state will require the center to be based in Florida and will pay based on the calls handled, because call volumes fluctuate each month.

''We're throwing every resource we can at this,'' Corder said. ``With the economy the way it is, and with two federal extensions , our customers don't ever leave us. They can't find jobs.''

AWI says it has no way of knowing how many callers don't get through to a live agent.

Unable to get through, many turn to the governor's office or legislators for help.

''We get calls all the time. They're just overwhelmed,'' said Rep. Keith Fitzgerald, a Sarasota Democrat. ``There are too many who need help and too few resources.''

At the same time, the pool of money to pay unemployment compensation is shrinking rapidly. It was at $619 million last week, down from $680 million the week before."

(And they are turning down the stimulus money?)

[denem]

13. Tell me it uses punch cards and hanging chads. Please!

:evilgrin:

[Statistical]

14. Here is an idea...... Fixing it would be a stimulus AND benefit taxpayers

Imagine that 2 birds with one stone.

Seriously though I hope stimulus bill considers essential software components to be "infrastructure".

We rely on interconnected networks, not just the hardware but in many cases specialized aging software just as much as we do roads, power, water, bridges, etc.

There are lots of govt systems that are essentially ancient. Many are written in languages no longer taught, are poorly documented, and have decades of "one time fixes" added.

I had a high paying contract job deciphering undocumented COBOL code that managed benefits for Fortune 500 company.

The hourly rate was astonishing (not even including the chunk the temp agency took) it paid even better than my current job now (but was temp & no benefits).

The job was a nightmare. I knew it would be bad but the code was so poorly written I am surprised the system survived this long. It was designed for a small company (maybe 100 employees tops) and programmers made certain assumptions that are no longer valid. The company also grew by a magnitude over 20,000 records at the time we updated the system.

Originally the company WANTED TO KEEP IT. They just wanted us to modernize it. The system had no way to record same sex partners, adoptions, college age dependents, mentally handicap dependents owing to the fact it was written in 1960s. It also had no way to handle certain unusual conditions like an employee married to another employee and then gets divorced.

Luckily we convinced the company a new system based on modern programming and being object oriented type safe, expandable and built from ground up to handle 20K-200K employees would be an investment.

[No More Bushbots]

18. Good idea

Except they would use it as an excuse to bring in a bunch of 12,000 a year H1-B Indians to program it for them.
Tell ya what, put all the out of work American IT employees that you put out of work as part of retribution for the Y2K project back to work first.
If any part of the American workforce needs to Unionize, it's Information Technology.

[Statistical]

19. There has been a push to Unionize Software Developers

It just hasn't been very successful.

I do think H1B program has merit however it needs a huge overhaul.

If a company lays off 1000 Americans it should be prevented from using H1B program until an equal number of Americans are hired back or it can PROVE that Americans are not available.

[madfloridian]

20. Why do you think the H1B has merit?

Especially in times like this when so many can not find work?

[Statistical]

22. I think H1B program is broken like the banking system is broken.

However anyone saying get rid of all banks and use cash only hasn't really though it out.

H1B shouldn't be used at all times and under all conditions but there is a legitimate need for H1B especially in booming economy.

i think companies that layoff x workers (say 100) should be require to hire 100 workers before using H1B program.
I think govt should closer regulate H1B apps and total # of slots based on the economy.

I likely would have lost my job a few years ago when we run behind schedule and were unable to find qualified workers without H1B program.

Sometimes it is extremely difficult for companies to find qualified workers in some IT fields.


Now please understand I do believe current usage of H1B program as access to a pool of cheap and unlimited labor is wrong.
I am not defending that. It needs serious regulatory oversight. Companies should be required to pay full wage (as determined by 3rd party) for H1B workers to avoid it being used for reasons other than what it was intended for (to replace shortages of skilled labor).

[vanboggie]

23. In all fairness, it wasn't a priority

Florida spent beaucoup bucks on computerized voting (cheating) machines to make it appear that Jebbie's big bro "won" the 2000 election. To heck with workers who need unemployment - there was the USA and world to plunder and that election had to be stolen to facilitate the neo-con objectives. Bastards.

[valerief]

24. Ee-yew. Good reason to avoid Jebland. Like there aren't plenty enough already.

It ain't all Golden Girls there.

[Skittles]

25. no excuse for that

I operate mainframes and I install updates/changes/maintenance every fucking weekend.