Is the government shutdown affecting you? How?

Well, are you not lucky that you were not one of the eight hundred thousand people that were sent home, or one of the employees of government contractors that were sent home as well.

So this raises another question. Everyone says our goverment is too big, but yet if we suggest that any goverment employee loose their job, that is met with shouts of protest. I do feel for anyone that looses their job under any circumstances. But when eight hundred thousand people don’t report to work and it barely causes a ripple in society, isn’t that a sure sign that too many people are on the taxpayers payroll?

What government are you talking about? Or are you speaking in past tense?

Umm… you mean the government shutdown that is over?

And perhaps you should ask this congressman who voted for the shutdown whether there was any noticeable effect.

You didn’t try to go to a National Park? You live in an area of the country that doesn’t ever have natural disasters? Your business doesn’t have customers that are federal employees? You didn’t travel by air or sea?

Guess you’re lucky. The shutdown affected me in a half dozen different ways.

And I guess you don’t pay attention to the news – the shutdown ended a week ago, after costing $24 Billion.

No effect whatsoever.

No effect.

Sure seems like not all 800K are needed.

The only effect on me I was and still am aware of is a combination of anger, helplessness and stress.

The only effect I noticed was a vast waste of tax money.

So it’s over now? Sorry, I have been busy lately and didn’t hear. Shows how much it affected me – NOT. So tell me about these 800K non-essential goverment employees…are they going to get their back pay, even though they didn’t work? Can we hope to recoup some of our tax money from their lost wages, or do they get it anyway? I want a job like that – they lock me out but pay me anyway. The government employees that I know personally went elk hunting to pass the time. What a hard life!

@Skaggfacemutt Or did we break even with all the salaries not taken by our mighty leaders? Wouldn’t that be ironic.

This prideful display of selfishness, egotism and rejection of any experience but their own is simply staggering.

@Skaggfacemutt Not everyone says our government is too big. And it caused a lot more than a ripple in society. People who had real business with the government that was not threatening life or limb or other disaster were not able to get anything done.

I just think we depend on our government too much. It wasn’t ever designed to be what it has become. We are all going to be crushed by it’s weight. We ARE being crushed by its weight. So who, exactly, was affected? Those who depend on government handouts? Those who depend on government contracts? Is that the way a free society is supposed to be structured?

Well, for the length of the shutdown, I had to live with the knowledge that nearly a million people, mostly low to moderately paid government employees, had to go without a paycheck for an indeterminate period of time because some overpaid, underproductive douchenozzles threw a temper tantrum.

@Seek_Kolinahr Good point, actually. The moderately paid goverment employees probably could have run the country just fine by themselves, without the overpaid, underproductive douchebags.

My daughter went on her school trip to DC during the shutdown. Half the sites were closed – thanks a lot. That taught her something about US govt. She did, however, get to see Pelosi hammer the Republicans in the Capitol.

For me, the NASA LADEE spacecraft was in a critical phase, so NASA stayed open and operated it on schedule.

It will cause the tax table for the IRS to be late by two weeks in February instead of January.
Impacts all tax payers.
There goes the early returns for me.

The same guys that shutdown the Government voted to pay the government workers next month for their time off. Two weeks of lost productivity, two weeks of pay that will come maybe a month late and the Republicans say they got what they wanted.

* * Sidebar – - it will happen again in February when the try to crash the ACA / Obamacare again.

@Tropical_Willie How depressing. I feel like we are being held hostage by our own government. By the time we realize how bad it has become, the country will be ravaged to the point of no return.

The Tea Party is trying to end ACA / Obamacare and any cost and that is ANY COST.

My mom delivers papers for the New York Times at night. She generally works from about 1am to 4am every single night of the week. Seriously, every night for the last six years. They pay so little she gets around 170 per month in food stamps. The shutdown did fuck that up so she had to ask me for pasta and hamburger money. Money that I didn’t really have.

@Skaggfacemutt Don’t confuse “the Government (i.e., all the people who help run all the departments we’ve wanted over the years) with “our elected officials” especially one party in particular that decided this was the method to get their way.

The Government did not hold us hostage, the Republican Party held us hostage. And if you feel that we should not be held hostage like this ever again, don’t vote for the people that did it – John Boehner, Ted Cruz, and the Tea Party Republicans.

@zenvelo AMEN, brother! You can say that again!!

It didn’t affect me in any noticeable.

By the way, the government shutdown ended a week ago.

Three of my subordinates at my base and a lot of other federal technicians here were not getting paid for a couple of weeks. As you might imagine, that was pretty damn unpleasant for them. Military members shouldn’t have to worry about whether they can pay their next mortgage payment on time or whether they can get groceries and other necessities to support their families. The U.S. governement is a huge embarrassment as of late with very poor politicians and their greedy, self-serving, unprofessional, and deplorable antics.

It did not affect me at all.

I wasn’t personally affected but I know people who were. Several friends of mine were unable to get Wic for their newborns because the facility shutdown.

My husband lost time at work and pay.