There are 2 approaches to the welfare problem. Reagan talked about welfare queens and simply slashed the budget. Many people couldn’t adjust cold turkey and we had problems at the margins.
But I think we should approach UI the same way we treated welfare in the 90’s. Let’s block grant it (along with job training programs-see link below) to the states and eliminate the entitlement mandate. The federal govt should allow maximum flexibility but would ask the states for results: are you really putting people back to work?
also see
http://heritage.org/Research/Reports/1995/10/BG1058nbsp-How-to-Close-Down
We had so much unfinished business from the 90’s but Bush didn’t shut down a single cabinet dept or program despite having both the House and Senate. That is truly a shame.