Posted on 09/24/2023 7:10:28 AM PDT by Oldeconomybuyer
With six kids under the age of 15 to support, Stephen Booth, a police officer for the Air Force in Kansas, doesn’t have room in his budget for a missed paycheck.
But like millions of other government employees across the country, Booth is bracing for his pay to stop indefinitely at the end of the month as Congress careers toward a government shutdown.
House Republicans left Thursday unable to reach a compromise within their ranks over a new budget, including funds for the Defense Department, with a handful of conservative holdouts demanding additional spending cuts. Unless Congress acts, the federal government will not be able to pay its 4 million employees after Sept. 30.
The shutdown comes at a particularly precarious time for many households already struggling with persistent inflation that has driven up the cost of rent, child care, groceries, transportation and utilities. At the same time, a string of Covid-era benefits have been expiring, such as the child tax credit, rental assistance and the pause on student loan payments, which are now set to resume in October. To cope, households have been spending down their savings and increasing their credit card debts over the past year.
“It’s really rice and beans time,” said Amad Ali, a claims specialist with the Social Security Administration in New Albany, Indiana, and president of his local AFGE union. “Most of us are dedicated civil servants and we keep on doing it, we keep on pushing forward, but it’s tough.”
(Excerpt) Read more at nbcnews.com ...
BTTT
Wow!
You hardly ever see good news published by NBC.
But, it really doesn’t matter. They will get paid whenever a budget gets passed.
Congress does it every time.
They leaches get an unscheduled vacation courtesy of the taxpayers.
Any fool with a few dollars set aside for a rainy day will have no problem dealing with a couple weeks without pay
Largest corporation in the world - the US Government.
As of 2020 the re-election rate for Congress was 95%. I don’t imagine that it has changed much since then. The budget mess we have right now, face it, the people want it! Why do I say that? The vote for it at a 90%+ rate by returning their clowns to office.
Unemployed fascists. But not really unemployed…they’re ready to lay the hammer down on the people…for free, for a little while.
Every government shutdown I suffered through I always got paid. My disability checks always came through. The government issued multiple lies.
“It’s really rice and beans time,” said Amad Ali
No it isn’t. Never has been.
They have artificial stupidity recycling the same story before every government shutdown threat...
Boring!
Any federal employee living paycheck to paycheck needs Dave Ramsey boot camp.
They need to learn how to budget until it hurts.
Boo friggin' Hoo.
1. Is my day filled with constitutionally allowed and useful work that provide value to the taxpayer?
Yes, I work for the Defense Department, do work directly related to deterring attack from current and potential enemies
2. Can I do my job with fewer subordinates?
No, I lead a team of three and we’re constantly busy, if we were smaller there would be no slack to cover employee life events, and you’d burn out people in six months or less.
3. How much of my time is spent providing direct and useful service to the taxpaying public?
80%, I spend ~20% of my time either on administrative duties or waiting on feedback, leader approval, or information I require to proceed.
4. How much of my time is spent dealing with support service contractors whose job is to justify more support service contractors by taking up more time from their federal “supervisors?”
In my case none, I have two contract employees I oversee, they do the data gathering and document prep, generally value added (both are retired Marine field grade officers)
5. should my whole department be eliminated?
No, I work for the Defense Department, a core constitutional function.
6. should my whole agency be eliminated?
No, my specific command conducts overwatch of hostile groups who vow to destroy the U.S. and institute a global caliphate. We also monitor Chinese, Russian and Iranian efforts to undermine U.S. interests.
7. Have I vocally advocated for substantial improvements in delivery of value to the taxpayer?
Not applicable, we’ve seen significant reductions in capabilities, and have to rely heavily on intermittent availability of resources to mitigate lost/reduced capabilities.
8. Am I reviled for this? [no? you’re not trying hard enough]
Per above, this doesn’t apply
Your questions, while a good start, view all agencies identically. From my perspective of 30 plus years of military and civil service. The problems are not spread evenly across the entire government and have different natures to them.
DoD’s problems are bad policies from the current administration and a procurement process, mandated by law, that creates perverse incentives and inefficiencies as by product of repeated “fixes” over time.
To look at an another example. The FBI, on the other hand, has an institutional arrogance that stems from J. Edgar Hoover’s legacy. He, more than anyone else, made it a powerful tool to stymie political enemies. Now that he is gone other political actors fight over how to use that tool. The bureau has a core structural problem, and it needs to be caged, broken apart and reassembled into useful (and separate) interstate crime fighting, counter-intelligence, and anti-corruption agencies.
Have a look at the fleet of vehicles in any federal response, the best of everything. You never see less than an 3/4 ton four wheel drive pickup. I am a federal employee brat fromt he 60s. Back then you had to move heaven and earth to get a stripped 1/2 ton four wheel drive pickup in the motor pool.
The feds can't change a light bulb any more without a truck load of tools and safety gear and a contractor to advise them.
4,000,000 employee dependents is just the tip of the iceberg. That number is well supported by an army of contractors.
The thing these federal dependents need to ask is: * AM I USEFUL? * AM I ESSENTIAL TO THE FUNCTION OF THE NATION? * DO I ADD VALUE? * DID I EARN MY KEEP TODAY OR ANY OTHER DAY? * WOULD ANYTHING REALLY BAD HAPPEN IF I DON'T SHOW UP FOR WORK? Probably not.
Kinda cut to the chase there don’t you? Great question. Why hire someone that costs more than a soldier to do a job a soldier should do?
Pull cut 32, roll tape on gooberment sob stories.
Nothing, civil service DoD police provide continuity and experience to augment a much younger and constantly rotating military police contingent at military installations.
You're EXACTLY RIGHT!
Their job to to"run interference" with a "Bait & BULL$HIT" FAKE NEWS operation.
I had a business contact that shared an office building with the Houston IRS office. You could not kick your way through the smoking leper colony in the parking garage. You were taking your life in your hands to be anywhere near the exits before lunch or quitting time because you would get trampled in the stampede. Most of the employees were democrats. Their group looked like a calico quilt. I shuddered to think that so many of them had access to my SSN and financial records.
The FedGov workers we sometimes work with worked anyway, during the last two shutdowns, even though the “higher ups” warned them not to work.
Stuff needed to be done - and the office being empty was a great time to do some cable mining. The sites they went to did not have on-site security so it was not a hassle getting access to facilities.
It later turned out that “higher ups” neglected to tell this team of workers that they were cleared to work during a shutdown. So it all worked out in the end.
Blah blah blah blah blah blah blah. Pay at risk? Seriously come on, gawd these people think we’re so stupid.
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