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is anyone's office being impacted by the gov't shutdown?

I'm curious if anyone's office are (or will) experience any impacts due to the shutdown that's now 8 hours old. 

We have a small GSA project that will be put on hold; it's impact on our overall firm will be negligible. My brother's engineering firm is going to be highly impacted, as a lot of their work is for the feds.

I have to imagine firms working on larger federal projects could have more serious problems (cash flow wise) if this drags out more than a week or so.

Anyone else? I'd be curious to compile a kind of informal survey.

 
Oct 1, 13 8:55 am

Heard a snippet on National Propaganda Radio in the car this morning.

Obama: ".. have to put and end to this before people decide they like it"

Apparently he was talking about the ACA. I thought he was talking about the shutdown.

Oct 1, 13 9:08 am  · 
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Thank you for this post! I've been asking people (ok, the only two humans besides my family that I interact with when I arrive pre-dawn at my job) if they know any personal impact stories, too.  Just so I have a real understanding of it, not a media-filtered one.

Answer: yes.  One of the people I asked knows someone who will not get a paycheck this week even though he is expected to show up at work.  But no impact on me personally.

Anyone else?

Oct 1, 13 9:09 am  · 
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LITS4FormZ

Some former classmates have been bitching on social media for a while now. They have been in government services throughout the recession (with yearly raises and generous bonuses) while we were all scrambling for work. 

Keep it going, I'm sure I'll get mail today...flyers/ads and credit card offers. Pretty much sums up my experience with government. 

Oct 1, 13 11:08 am  · 
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The Community Development programs HUD Block Grants and the very nice folks who we call and ask questions for the affordable housing master-plan project that we were about to start are on hold as we need some clarifications as to what can be done with land purchased under those programs and what can further be funded under other programs. So no one to answer questions makes it hard to proceed.

Also the disbursements from federal student aide may be late or delayed for the coming semesters or quarters depending on what college or university you are attending.

The Shutdown is just round one wait till we default on the Debt in two weeks.

Oct 1, 13 12:22 pm  · 
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curtkram

who's supposed to show up without a paycheck?  i thought the people affected get to take the day off. 

the post office is operational.  someone at the office here asked, so i checked their website.  i wonder if they're not getting paid and just expect the back-pay thing to be passed after the fact?

Oct 1, 13 1:15 pm  · 
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Curtkram, I think the Post office in the US is the only postal service that is not funded by the government, in fact the postal service is a source of revenue for the government. The day to day operations are funded through postage sales and other services and they have a monopoly on letter delivery. Think of it this way, anything that collects money is part of the essential services, and anything that would stop commerce is essential. Head start, food stamps, Unemployment not essential.  I think as the shutdown grows from days to weeks we will see some serious economic consequences.

Lets hope the House of Representatives can give up repealing Obama Care long enough to take care of the basics.

Oct 1, 13 2:28 pm  · 
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The Postal Service is a separate "business entity" is how I understand it.

My PTA already sent out an email asking parents at our school to be ready: the school lunch program funded by Title 1 *thinks* they have enough funding to continue providing school lunch (in many cases the only healthy food a Title 1 student gets in a day) through October.  But if the shutdown lasts longer than that we parents are being asked to be prepared to help out. 

Also, WIC payments are likely to be unprocessed in a week or two.  Way to go, Teabaggers: starve a bunch of already food-insecure children. Fuckers.

 

Sorry to derail your thread Greg but I. Am. Pissed. Off. and this is the best place to vent at the moment.

Oct 1, 13 2:50 pm  · 
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curtkram

i don't think this can go for weeks.  our government has had shut-downs from these continuing resolution votes a few times before.  it would seem abortion was a hot topic around the carter years, and caused a few of them. there were a couple in the reagen years when he was trying to build up missle defense while cutting safety net programs, and then the clinton v. contract with america people. 

long story short, the republicans have cost themselves votes towards holding the majority in the house next election cycle.  i don't think the tea party are that threatened due to the way they gerrymandered their districts, but the tea party alone isn't going to be able to keep the a republican sitting in the speaker's seat.  for the time being, their math apparently suggests the damage isn't enough to lose the majority yet, but i don't think there is any question that they will if they keep this up.

Oct 1, 13 3:01 pm  · 
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Most projects are run through state, county, and city government. Very few public works are federally funded.

In other news, our office manager called the IRS today who apparently aren't open today due to budget cuts and are unclear on when they will return.

Oct 1, 13 6:35 pm  · 
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gruen
Stupid idiots playing god with other people's lives for a stupid ideological stance.
Oct 1, 13 8:06 pm  · 
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Votes don't matter. The most money wins 90% of the time.

It's hard to see how this costs Republicans much of anything except maybe Boner's seat as speaker. Congressional approval ratings are around 10%. That's Republicans AND Democrats. And both of them get mountains of money from corporate interests.

Oct 1, 13 8:43 pm  · 
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donna - you can derail my posts anytime. 

one actual story i was told today: one of our projects is being funded through a federal grant/loan (not sure which offhand), as is the entire county gov. department. they have about 3 months of trailing revenue, so a relatively short term "slimdown" won't impact them but could do some serious damage to a lot of very good, very needed programs in our community if it goes on past a few weeks.

Oct 2, 13 1:17 pm  · 
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The daughter of a blogger I read had to cancel her honeymoon because her military husband's leave was cancelled. Their honeymoon!

Oct 2, 13 3:58 pm  · 
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Not affected directly by the shutdown, but I do have a client I've been working with on and off over three years who is paid by the military, and was going to rely on access to some of their loan programs to fund his renovation/addition. Because this nonsense about the debt ceiling has been going on for almost that much time, he's been unable to hit *go* on the project, because the status of those loan programs has been in doubt this whole time. We call each other about once every six months or so. He's a great client, with excellent sensibilities, it would be a very cool project for everyone, but no.

Oct 3, 13 5:58 pm  · 
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MyDream

I just found out that my office has 3 projects that are stalled because of the shutdown. They are military projects and all construction are at a stand still because of the shut down WTF........

Oct 14, 13 11:22 am  · 
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Not meant to reflect on you personally, but stopping military projects is a good thing. If only we could do it permanently.

Oct 14, 13 11:31 am  · 
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MyDream

^ NOT WHEN IT STOPS MAKING MY FIRM MONEY......SHIT... I'LL DRAFT THAT WHOLE FREAKIN COMPLEX IF IT MAKES MY BOSSES+ME MONEY........lol.......... no offense of course.

Oct 14, 13 1:08 pm  · 
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curtkram

stopping building bombs and such might help, but stopping military projects isn't good.  our military is big.  they have a lot of old buildings that should be renovated to meet current energy standards.  to stop military projects is not the same as stopping military expansion.

Oct 14, 13 1:28 pm  · 
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OK, let's not stop it. Lets just reduce it by 75%. That will free up 3/4 trillion a year for health care, education, infrastructure, etc. all of which would be a huge boost for the economy.


Oct 14, 13 2:37 pm  · 
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backbay

our military also supports a significant portion of our economy.  a good portion (i want to say majority) of engineering firms run on military projects, and those firms support a lot of manufacturers, machine shops, etc.  its like 4-5% of gdp.  

but lets not be ridiculous... if we freed up 3/4 of a trillion dollars a year, not a drop of it would go to education, infrastructure, or health care.  if those areas were important enough to congress we'd already be spending money on them.

Oct 14, 13 9:20 pm  · 
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The military is arguably the least productive way to support the US economy. Except maybe for direct subsidies to corporate corn producers and cigarette companies.

Oct 14, 13 10:09 pm  · 
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backbay

"least" is a strong word... i can think of half a dozen "help the economy" political/pandering gimmicks that do anything but that, but otherwise agreed.  if you want to go that route, the best way to (technically and mathematically) make the economy grow would be to stick to rigid, highly volatile, boom bust classical economics, with little to no government interference.  but as history has made clear, its not livable.

As far as science and engineering go, the government funded projects are the ones that help keep us competitive and on the cutting edge.  it all comes down to what you value and what you want to spend money on.

Oct 15, 13 2:54 am  · 
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A growth economy is a fallacy. It assumes infinite resources and infinite demand. The medical term for unrestrained growth is cancer.



One of the purposes of government is supposed to be to regulate the economy for the benefit of society. But we abandoned that long ago with the Federal Reserve system.  


Oct 15, 13 8:44 am  · 
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DeTwan

Amen,

If anyone is in doubt about what Miles has said, just visit these...

<iframe width="640" height="360" src="//www.youtube.com/embed/uNNeVu8wUak?feature=player_detailpage" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>

<iframe width="640" height="360" src="//www.youtube.com/embed/x5aUUFVRPtI?feature=player_detailpage" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>

Oct 15, 13 10:08 am  · 
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