Posted on 10/07/2013 6:33:38 AM PDT by Qbert
Everyone knows the phrase "government shutdown" doesn't mean the entire U.S. government is shut down. So in a partial government shutdown, like the one underway at the moment, how much of the government is actually shut down, and how much is not?
One way to measure that is in how much money the government spends. In a conversation Thursday, a Republican member of Congress mentioned that the military pay act, passed by Congress and signed by President Obama at the beginning of the shutdown, is actually a huge percentage of the government's discretionary spending in any given year. And that is still flowing. So if you took that money, and added it to all the entitlement spending that is unaffected by a shutdown, plus all the areas of spending that are exempted from a shutdown, and added it all together, how much of the federal government's total spending is still underway even though the government is technically shut down?
I asked a Republican source on the Senate Budget Committee for an estimate. This was the answer: "Based on estimates drawn from CBO and OMB data, 83 percent of government operations will continue. This figure assumes that the government pays amounts due on appropriations obligated before the shutdown ($512 billion), spends $225 billion on exempted military and civilian personnel, pays entitlement benefits for those found eligible before the shutdown (about $2 trillion), and pays interest costs when due ($237 billion). This is about 83 percent of projected 2014 spending of $3.6 trillion."
So the government shutdown, at least as measured by money spent, is really a 17 percent government shutdown. Perhaps that is why the effects of the shutdown, beyond some of the most visible problems, like at the monuments and memorials on the Washington Mall, don't seem to have the expected intensity. Seventeen percent of federal expenditures is still a huge amount of money, and the shutdown is affecting many people. But many more who are dependent on federal dollars are still receiving their money, either as salary, transfer payment, or in some other form. Viewed that way, it's no wonder both Republicans and Democrats appear to believe they can last the shutdown out, at least for a couple of weeks until they try to resolve the debt limit crisis due to arrive October 17.
Yep—17% is a good start and probably about right for now, before we effect more structural regression.
Good point. Once back-pay is inserted into the equation I would think the savings in a shudown is very low. A shutdown just means we pay government employees to goof off and harrass us at monuments.
so the feds will be taking 17% less from my paycheck this week, right?
Timeout.
It’s more like a “Slim-Down”.
MUST READ: DEBT CEILING A DEMOCRAT RUSE
The debt ceiling propaganda is a radical ruse by obozo and his minions to try to force the Pubbies into a cave in on obozocare and push America that much further into the Marxist hellhole obozo promised his ignorant supporters in 2008!
Raising the debt ceiling WITHOUT reigning in SPENDING and telling those “non-essential” bureaucrats to get REAL jobs (if they can find them) is a recipe for the further destruction of what remains of America.
If he takes us into default, it will be because HE made the decision to do so.
FACT: We are nowhere near that even with a complete budget stall. The US takes in nearly $250 BILLION in tax revenues each month. This is more than 10 times what is needed to service the interest on the debt ($220BILLION/year).
What this shutdown does, however, is force Obama into a position where he would have to prioritize the spending for what is left. It would NOT be the total chaos being pushed by the Dems and their lapdog media.
If you want your country back, ignore these phony scare tactics.
PLEASE SHARE THIS WITH EVERYONE YOU KNOW. Don’t bother with the obozombies. They wouldn’t recognize a fact if it bit them on the ass.
No, but I’m taking home close to 17% less after health care cost increases are factored in, so that balances.
haha, honestly! “O Give me a home ...”
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