COLUMBIA --- Workers receiving severance pay in South Carolina wouldn't be permitted to get unemployment checks at the same time under legislation a Senate panel approved Thursday as part of an overhaul of the state's unemployment system.

"For somebody to be able to collect severance and unemployment at the same time is double-dipping out of an employer," said Sen. Greg Ryberg, R-Aiken.

Mr. Ryberg, the Senate Labor, Commerce and Industry Committee's chairman, says the severance payments should be treated as income that offsets whatever unemployment benefit a person may get. Details would be worked out later on how lump-sum severance payments are handled.

The legislation does nothing directly to address the busted trust fund covering unemployment benefits. Since December, the state has borrowed $220.6 million from the federal government to cover checks as the state jobless rate climbed to the nation's second-highest -- 10.4 percent -- in January.

"The shortfall in the trust fund is going to have to come off -- eventually come off -- the backs of business. The question is do you do it now or do you do it later. Now is the wrong time to raise the taxes on businesses," Mr. Ryberg said.