If the shutdown keeps going to an extended period of time, it will be interesting to see the long term effects of having a large amount of entrenched bureaucrats suddenly removed and replaced by new ones.
I think that in the future if this keeps going there will probably be noticeable policy differences and shifts in the bureaucracy after this. Definitely a point of history that people should look to for ripple effects later down the line.
Critically think about the ripple effect of this situation:
1. It is clearly political shenanigans without a doubt, but;
2. Does this peal back the wool from the fact that, just maybe, we don't need this many government employees?
3. Reveals that senators who are both millionaires and still receiving pay, don't actually have your interests in mind
4. That taxes are wasted and a joke with respect to how they are implemented / allocated
5. that our security infrsastructure sold to us in the trillions is a 2-paycheck fragile sham (TSA) -- but the actual safety (Air Traffick Control) is in the same bucket?
6. That the media's only value is kvetching on the political bullshit of the literal moment (meaning: They teach nothing - only commentary)
7. the USA is a fealty based system beholden to literally a few hundred oligarchs
> 3. Reveals that senators who are both millionaires and still receiving pay, don't actually have your interests in mind
Senator Pay is $174k, which is less than senior developers around the tech world.
Your senior developer who frequents this site will make far more money than any Senator. The reason why Senators are millionares is because you need to be a millionare to even consider running for office (with all of the organization, ads, and stuff you need to buy...)
> Critically think about the ripple effect of this situation:
No. That's precisely WHY Republicans are shutting down the government. Because they want to push forward those viewpoints.
Its why Republicans are so happy to keep things shut down: the longer things are shut down, the more their point is proven ("That Government is inefficient").
Its a fundamental advantage Republicans have to shutdowns. Every shutdown "proves their point" innately.
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Government workers make far less than their counterparts in the private world. A "Senator" is the leader of an entire State, but will make far less money than a typical executive at any ol company.
Want to know where all of our good leaders have gone? They've gone into corporate leadership. Any ol' executive position at any major company will make multiples over a Senator or House member's salary.
> Senator Pay is $174k, which is less than senior developers around the tech world.
Isn't this just a stipend to cover housing/food while drumming up kickbacks, insider trade information, or cushy post-office executive positions in many (unfortunate) cases?
not sure if we can necessarily rely on base pay as being an accurate measure of income related to being a senator..
I'm not sure how that's much different to any executive position.
Your typical executive will have a base pay well over 200k, and then get a contract kickback based on performance. I have my doubts that any Senator actually makes as much as say... a Microsoft Executive.
And that's like, minor executive level. If you're a 3-letter executive (CEO, CFO, etc. etc.), expect $million+ paychecks with stock compensations on top of that, based on performance. Consider the Sears CEO who destroyed the company, he's making millions extra in bonuses, with a golden parachute to land safely even as the company withers and dies.
He's got enough sense to wipe out his base pay to $1. But we all know that's a fake number anyway. In any case, the amount of money a Senator makes from their position or power is tiny in comparison to positions in private companies. The fact is: the US Government is not in the business of making money. They're in the business of providing essential services to the citizens (Military, Police, Post Office, etc. etc.), of which doesn't typically make a profit.
I don’t see #2. What it has shown is that “non-essential” government workers do things that don’t have immediate consequences (kind of obvious), and that “essential” workers still show up without being paid at least for a while. As it drags on, it’s also starting to show that what these people do is actually kind of important.
Replaced by new ones? Who's going to apply for a job with no prospect of getting paid, and where you'll be asked to perform not only your work but that of an increasing number of missing colleagues?
Agreed. Trump said that he would 'drain the swamp'[0], and I think this is one of the reasons why he's OK with the shutdown lasting indefinitely.
One of my friends said that DC has never experienced a recession. I hate how negative this sounds, but DC is finally realizing what happens when the largest employer in town suddenly closes. This is something that (pro-Trump) small town America has been having to deal with for at least the past 30 years.
There needs to be some risk to being a public service employee. They practically cannot get fired. They should not get back-pay for government shutdown time they did not work. So, TSA agents, for example, absolutely should get back-pay (because they worked), but employees who got furloughed should not. And we should make it easier to fire public service employees for cause, and easier to downsize agencies (i.e., lay-off workers). Civil service protections need to be about politics, not so overarching that civil service employment carries zero risk.
The ability for a person to earn a fair living, especially one that's not an extravagant salary, should never have unnecessary risk. It's one thing to be laid off. It's another to be told you're working without pay or are not allowed to seek other employment while furloughed.
US government shutdowns (especially extended ones) are rare events. This is not something most of them would have considered when signing on.
Even in the 90s and 00s with the DoD closing bases (BRAC), a lot of people were unimpacted or given job offers at other locations which mitigated the risk for most.
Government employees are, on the whole, underpaid for the sort of work they do compared to private sector equivalents (or where their expertise could be used if not the same job). The primary benefit has been the stability and pension system, both of which are being challenged in recent years.
> US government shutdowns (especially extended ones) are rare events
Sorry but no. I worked for the government for 9 years and went through four shutdowns. I'd hardly call that rare. On NPR this morning they were interviewing people who said the same thing (so it's not just me). I was also not one of the lucky ones that got furloughed. When I was there a lot of people loved shutdowns because it was free vacation time. They knew they'd get backpay. The only thing they couldn't do was go out of town since any day they could be called back.
> This is not something most of them would have considered when signing on.
True.
> Government employees are, on the whole, underpaid for the sort of work they do compared to private sector equivalents (or where their expertise could be used if not the same job). The primary benefit has been the stability and pension system, both of which are being challenged in recent years.
Debatable. The government is a huge industry, and over-generalizing like that is impossible to do while maintaining any level of accuracy. Remember to include benefits as well as paycheck in your analysis.
This one is extremely long, though. It’s the longest on record and still getting longer, so it’s not something people would have anticipated. I can see how someone would enjoy a few days off of work, maybe even a week or two. But going a month or more without pay is quite a different matter.
Historically rare. There have been 10 shutdowns in the history of the US government (there have been other funding gaps, but none of those had furloughed employees). 3 of those shutdowns in this decade. 4 in the 80s and 3 in the 90s. The shutdowns in the 80s were one day each. The 90s were 3, 5, and 21 days each.
A lot of us (myself included), might work in startups and take big risks in our careers, but we're also exposed to a lot more upside. Not every other job should be like this, and lots of people don't want to work in such uncertain situations. These people thought they had a job that was largely safe, and that implicit promise has been broken.
Yet there is no precedent for this. Nor should there be.
I would be entirely unsurprised if this caused many professionals to leave public service, since the risk of not being able to make rent is now known. Why would anyone knowingly take a job that could suddenly and unexpectedly stop paying them a salary for unreasonable periods of time?
They did not. IRS jobs are not "essential" within the meaning of the rules requiring certain governmental personnel to work during shutdowns.
In a nutshell and highly simplified, but "essential" in the shutdown context means national security and transportation. It doesn't include functions that are nice to have, like quick processing of refunds.
Private sector employees carry the risk of being fired or laid off. I don't see why public sector employees should not. They should have some protections from political firings, but that's it.
Salary levels have nothing to do with it. Perhaps they might have to be higher if public sector employees had to have this risk, or perhaps there would be fewer people willing to work in the public sector (a win, that).
And again, if you hard to work w/o pay, you should get back-pay. This is only about furloughed employees.
This comment and the one above have bits that are clearly just snipes at public employees and the federal government.
> They practically cannot get fired.
> or perhaps there would be fewer people willing to work in the public sector (a win, that).
If you disagree with the size of our federal government on a political level that's no excuse to disrespect the people who work in it. Everybody is working for a pay check the virtues of the federal government have nothing to do with whether some people deserve to get what they negotiated for when they accepted a position.
Getting back pay isn't sufficient (and not guaranteed). If you have a job, you should get paid. Full stop. Being a government job shouldn't mean you can't pay your bills. Back pay doesn't stop you from becoming homeless.
Public sector employees take the risk of being fired by an administration who decides that unit isn't a priority.
Salary levels do determine risk - if you want someone to do a riskier job, you generally have to pay more - obviously there are a large number of other factors.
> Public sector employees take the risk of being fired by an administration who decides that unit isn't a priority.
They mostly don't, both because the Administration has limited legal and even more limited practical political ability to do that, and because civil service rules further mitigate that risk with noncompetitive reinstatement eligibility.
They do take the risk that the political branches together decide a function is unnecessary, mitigated somewhat by civil service reinstatement rules.
They can be fired and laid off just like everyone else.
The difference is they work for the oldest, singularly largest organization in the country and should, as part of that, expect some job stability.
The pay is usually marginal compared to private sector. The advantage you usually get is the government won't go bankrupt or get bought up and downsized.
Government employees are paid much MUCH less than their counterparts. The tacit agreement is that they get paid less but have more stability.
Any NASA Aerospace engineer will make more at Lockheed Martin or Northrop Grumman. Its just the facts. Missiles and Weapons make more money than generic US Space research, even if one is more fundamentally important to the advancement of our civilization. Any IRS Tax-expert will make more money as an Corporate Accountant (who are paid to avoid taxes, instead of applying them fairly across the country).
Most HN people work in a field where getting a new job is pretty trivial if you lose your current one - I've had job searches that have lasted as little as a few days (when I moved internationally), but most people are not in this situation. These workers are being denied an expected income - some of them are indeed not working for this income but they've been denied the ability to work for it.
Everyone, even people who were allowed to seek separate work, should be paid their expected wage - this would even inject a bit of consumer power into our economy and might help reduce the long term effects this is having.
Professional employees (lawyers, accountants, scientists) make less in government (usually much less), but non-professional employees usually make more in government.
How are you defining "professional" in this context?
There's a classical sense of professional it seems you're reaching for, but I'm having a hard time thinking of a non-professional white-collar worker which would do better in federal government than the private sector.
Eg, surveyors are clearly professionals. Software developers? IT?
Software engineers, IT, EE, ME, tend to be paid significantly less than they would make outside of gov service. This of course varies a bit by level, but it's generally true.
This comment has been downvoted but I wanted to highlight that it is quite correct, people actually working in the public sector tend to be paid poorly compared to similar private sector jobs, this is a bit of a new trend where the previous generation in the US was more familiar with public sector jobs being good paying reliable jobs that could help secure a family into the middle income bracket but that time has passed.
I am excluding, by the way, private contractors working in the public sector which tend to be grossly over paid but lack any sort of pension benefits.
Life always has risk in it. If they have risk-free jobs, that means someone else is shouldering the burden of the resources expended to make that job risk-free. Said someone else is probably doing it without a risk-free job of their own. Is that fair?
There'll be the temptation to muddy the waters with all sorts of things, like "how important" the government worker's work is. (The taxpayer's job can be perfectly well important too. You want to live without garbage collectors?) But that's all distractions. What right do they have to have such low-risk ("risk-free" is really not true, but there is certainly a qualitatively different degree of risk) jobs at the expense of people without such low-risk jobs?
Life isn't fair. If your job isn't risk free, you should be petitioning for unions and other labor protections, not dragging down those who do have those benefits.
This is no different then when the minimum wage rises, and people who were making what is now the new minimum wage complain that they're underpaid now. They were underpaid before, it's just more obvious to them after the policy change.
Don't be the crab pulling other crabs back into the pot. Help the other crabs get out, and consequently, helping you get out.
I think that in the future if this keeps going there will probably be noticeable policy differences and shifts in the bureaucracy after this. Definitely a point of history that people should look to for ripple effects later down the line.