If the new Federal budget is not in place by March 4, the Federal Government will have to close down.

Yes, there are people on both sides that will blame the other side. This is not the issue for this post.

What about the Federal Government employee who will be furloughed without a paycheck every 2 weeks? When you were starting out in your career, could you have gone for up to 6 or 8 weeks without a paycheck? This means mortgages can't be paid, insurance can't be paid, utilities can't be paid, etc.

This happened back in 1995 and Federal Government programs suffered such as timely payments of Social Security and Medicare payments. It also cost hundred of millions of dollars in paying the employees who were furloughed for back pay - and having done no work for that money. I was one of those but I had plenty to fall back on so I was not adversely affected. Should the government employee just forfeit the money or should he be paid like in 1995?

These "showdowns" do not have a happy ending for either party. No one wins. Blame will be shifted to the party you are not in.

a political game played every year to get what one or the other is seeking to include in the bill.
If private companies day in and day out, year in and year out there is no reason for the shut the government game to even be a consideration.
It is another crystal clear example of Washington doing business as usual.

So simple to solve but it never gets done. Why? Because there is a benefit to the lawmakers to keep it the way it is.

And way too many of we the people actually buy into the threat of closure being real! It is anything but.

btk

Well thought out, Bill. However, it does look like it is a very good possibility this year like back in 1995.

Oh my God.............................what are we gonna do, the sky is falling, I cant stop wringing my hands and pacing back and forth, know what.....

Less government= more prosperity and less regulation

They need to shut down maybe every 3 months, would suit me.

Originally Posted by Sparky-30

Oh my God.............................what are we gonna do, the sky is falling, I cant stop wringing my hands and pacing back and forth, know what.....

Less government= more prosperity and less regulation

They need to shut down maybe every 3 months, would suit me.

Lou, What department of the government did you work for in 1995? I was off of work for 2 weeks in November and 4 weeks in December. Yes, we got paid for all of the time off but not until after the furloughs were over and a new budget approved. Big waste of money.

it is a sham!!! A joke! A ploy!

How is it the pork projects don't shut down each year???

Because they don't need the ploy, the joke to get their allocated money.

How about not spending the pork dollars to keep the government Open?
Yeah right

btk

I am currently in the Federal workforce, and we (my much younger coworkers and I) can't even get a straight answer from our own agency.

It turns out March 4 coincides with our scheduled payday. The question we've been asking is whether the shutdown is effective as of the beginning of the day on March 4 (which means we would not report to work and would not be paid on that day) or the end of the day on March 4 (which means we would report to work and would be paid).

If anyone can answer this, thank you in advance.

It would be at 12:01 a.m. on March 4. Your agency will have advance directives in place just in case it happens. Yes, this is more wasted time over an issue that should never take place. Chances are that you will go to your office, be told in an intra-agency flyer not to do any government work that day and to leave at some point in the day.

When this happened to me in Washington DC back in 1995, the local and national television stations were all outside when employees left. It was up to the last person in each office to turn out the lights and to carry out a little American flag that had been distributed - by the Democrats. Newtie Boy Gingrich had no friends whatsoever at that time in the Federal workers.

It was only a short time after that Gingrich resigned in shame from the House of Representatives.

Thanks Tbugs. The only time I had to deal with this, I was told not to report to work. We were told that we could not even volunteer to come in on our own--we had to completely stay away from the office.

Hopefully we will have some more information next week.