Majority
This is an appeal from the denial by the Delaware Unemployment Compensation Commission of the appellant’s claim for unemployment compensation benefits.
The Commission aErmed the following decision of its Referee: “ * * it is decided that the claimant has removed himself from the labor market and is not actively seeking work. He is denied benefits during his current period of unemployment and until such time as the claimant may aErmatively show that
The Delaware Unemployment Compensation Law provides that an unemployed person shall be eligible for benefits only if he is found to be (1) able to work, (2) available for work, and (3) actively seeking work.[2] The first two eligibility requirements are contained in most unemployment compensation statutes. The third requirement is found in the statutes of only a few other states. The statutory requirements are stated in such general terms that much judicial and administrative interpretation has been required to give them meaning. As the result of such inteprotation, the availability requirement has been accorded a fixed meaning and purport. It is now settled that the purpose of the “available for work” provision is to test the defendant’s attachment to a labor market. In the instant case, it is apparent that the Commission failed to distinguish between the second and third eligibility requirements and that it applied to the “actively seeking work” requirement the test generally recognized as applicable to the “available for work” requirement.
Each of the statutory requirements has a separate meaning and purpose. In the interest of orderly administration, the distinction between the separate eligibility specifications
1 In support of his decision, the Referee had stated that in his opinion: “The evidence in this case shows clearly that the claimant has taken himself from a large industrial area such as Wilmington, Delaware, to a small community where very little work is available for him. He has practically removed himself from the labor market by establishing a residence in a community where there are no prospects for work. Had he remained in the Wilmington area, we feel certain that with his background and experience he would have eventually found work. * * * * * * “It is undoubtedly true that the claimant is able to work and is available for work; but, by taking himself to a community where there is no work available for him, we are compelled to conclude, he has removed himself from the labor market and has not been actively seeking work. * *
2 41 Delaware Laws, Chapter 258, Sec. 4(c), as amended by 46 Delaware Laws, Chapter 162, Sec. 3.
In order to expedite the disposition of the case, consideration will be given to the question of whether, under the facts, the appellant was “available for work”, within the meaning of the Statute. An oft-quoted statement of the meaning of this phrase appears at 55 Yale Law Journal, 123, 124: “The availability requirement is said to be satisfied when an individual is willing, able and ready to accept suitable work which he does not have good cause to refuse, that is, when he is genuinely attached to the labor market. Since, under unemployment compensation laws, it is the availability of an individual that is required to be tested, the labor market must be described in terms of the individual. A labor market for an individual exists when there is a market for the type of services which he offers in the geographical area in which he offers them. ‘Market’ in this sense does not mean that job vacancies must exist; the purpose of unemployment compensation is to compensate for the lack of appropriate job vacancies. It means only that the type of services which an individual is offering is generally performed in the geographical area in which he is offering them.”
In determining the existence of a labor market, the question is not whether the claimant had a reasonable opportunity to obtain work. The decisive question is whether the kind of services which the claimant was offering was generally performed in the geographical area in which he was seeking employment. A labor market may exist even though there be more applicants than there are job vacancies. Employment opportunity at the time of the offering of services is not a factor essential to the existence of a market for such services. Reger v. Administrator, Unemployment Compensation Act, 132 Conn. 647 , 46 A. 2d 844 , 846; cf. Roukey v. Riley, 96 N. H. 351 , 77
Moreover, there is no requirement in the Unemployment Compensation Act that a claimant must be available for work in the locality in which he last worked, or resided or in any other particular place. Nor is there any requirement that he must be available for his usual type of work. The fact that a claimant has moved from. one locality to another does not form a basis for holding him unavailable for work even if it appears that his chances for employment would have been better if he had remained in his former locality.
The appellant was offering services ranging from unskilled labor as a timekeeper to skilled work as an electrician. In view of the meaning of “labor market” as above stated, I am of the opinion that there is nothing in the Commission’s findings of fact, or elsewhere in the record, to sustain the conclusion that there was no labor market in and around Floral City for the types of services which the appellant was offering.
It is incumbent upon the Court to point out that the transcript of the testimony in this case contains numerous blank spaces caused, it seems, by the inability of the transcriber to reproduce in writing testimony which had been recorded by mechanical device. Upon appeal from the Commission, this Court is limited to the record made before the Commission. It is manifest that an incomplete record of the evidence makes impossible a proper review by this Court. In the instant case, it has been assumed that untranscribed testimony, indicated by blank spaces in the record, is not detrimental to the appellant’s interests.