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Federal Government Begins First Shutdown In 17 Years
- drill_sarge 13y agoIt's happening
- pachydermic 13y ago10% approval rating for congress. Wow. But my congressman is great! /s
- patrickg_zill 13y ago\o/
- oleganza 13y agoEven with all the money being printed by Fed (>80 billion usd per month!) there is not enough money for the biggest military+police government on Earth.
- rquantz 13y agoYou have a lot of things mixed up. This isn't about not enough money. It's about Congress having to pass a budget in order to run the government. Maybe you're thinking of the debt ceiling?
- deleted 13y ago[deleted]
- pachydermic 13y agohttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Federal_Reserve_Note http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Federal_Reserve_Note Fascinating stuff. Without going into the details... you know that the Federal Reserve doesn't pay the bills, right? The Treasury does. And when the Treasury pays the bills, it doesn't really have much to do with the Fed buying bonds on the open market. The Treasury pays bills based on interest on national debt, stuff like social security and spending approved by congress. For some reason, congress implemented laws which mean that they have to give permission to the Treasury to pay the bills that congress itself voted into the budget. My point is that this whole debacle doesn't really have to do much with the Fed, and the Treasury is just following the orders of congress. *Edit: Ah, I see from stalking your profile that you are not American. Well I can see why you'd be confused - shit's confusing. I don't think even most US citizens understand how it works.
- twoodfin 13y agoI'm glad this was posted here, otherwise I never would have known. Something all hackers should be paying attention to, certainly. Many implications for how we write our software, the future of networked communication and more.
- jmduke 13y agoI'm glad this was posted here, otherwise I never would have known. I don't mean this sarcastically -- are you serious? It's been plastered over my news and social feeds for the past 48 hours, but I recognize I have a disproportionately large amount of friends/acquaintances in DC.
- twoodfin 13y agoMy flag privileges were lost during a flight to Cuba, and the guidelines specify that we not complain about the relevance of posts in the comments. So I won't complain.
- jmduke 13y agoI just reread your comment and now I feel like a dunce. Leaving my original comment, so that I might better revel in my shame.
- jonchang 13y agoSarcasm can be difficult to express online; I'm glad you explicitly pointed it out in your reply.
- fivre 13y agoAll the news sites in the world to choose from and the one that hits the front page is the one with interstitials before articles and broken, ugly design?
- peterwayland 13y agoIn an office environment. If employees don't work well together they get fired. Why is there no accountability ?
- yellowbkpk 13y agoThere is. It happens in November every few years.
- rjbwork 13y agoWish i could get an extremely well paid job, do jack shit for 2-6 years and then maybe get voted out at the end of that time. Hell, give me a senator's salary for 6 years and I'd be in heaven.
- deleted 13y ago[deleted]
- sp332 13y agoYou can change who's in office, but it's basically impossible at this point to change the offices themselves. Committees and subcommittees, lobbies, corporations, military interests and other support systems are so entrenched that it literally doesn't matter who you put in power, the same problems will exist. Anyway, Congress isn't supposed to get along. If everyone agreed all the time we would be able to reduce the system to a single person who made all the decisions. The point to a representative democracy is that the representatives represent different interests. Even the idea of having a vote presupposes conflict.
- jliechti1 13y agoHow significant is this though? A quick wikipedia search shows the government has shut down 18 times (including this one) since 1976. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Government_shutdown#Federal_government http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Government_shutdown#Federal_gov... In fact, the government shut down almost every year from 1976 to 1987 (only missing 1980 and 1985).
- cshenoy 13y agoWell considering it hasn't happened since 1995 (18 years), I'd say it's pretty significant. Also, the GOP reasoning behind it seems pretty silly (defunding the ACA).
- adventured 13y agoIt's not very significant unto itself. Total government expenditures are about $6.7 trillion per year, between local + state + federal. The years will keep rolling on, and they're all going to keep spending more with little evidence of a good return on investment from the last $50 trillion they spent the prior decade. All greased by the nice annual trillion dollar shot from the Fed propping up the Federal Govt., the housing market (state property taxes, 'wealth effect') and the stock market. The most interesting thing about the shut down, is that it represents a total government failure of competency. All parties, the Congress, and the President; and not just now, but the last 20 years, leading up to this mess. From George W's hyper spending, to Clinton continuing the grand tradition of stealing from SS inflows to fake balance the budget, to Obama's hyper spending increases while the Democrats had super majority control of the House + Senate while they had the Presidency. Everybody is to blame in DC; the partisans claiming their side is right are to blame as well.
- throwaway420 13y agoI really hate that the media has labeled this a government shut down. Is the NSA going to stop spying on us? Are they still printing money? Are corporate subsidies still proceeding as normal? Will they stop taxing us? Will they stop giving out checks to the military industrial complex? Will they stop military attacks? Will we still be felt up at airports? Are they still going to throw people behind bars for illegal plants? The reality is that all of the worst parts of the government are still running.
- jMyles 13y agoNailed it. I'm surprised there isn't more talk about this.
- Q6T46nT668w6i3m 13y agoYeah! Treasonous National Parks!
- rhelmer 13y agoNot sure who counts as "military industrial complex", but the Pentagon has already said that troops will not be paid: http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5gC5rwPOPzH3nTjqtHiOZE3z6LtXg?docId=6e822e78-125b-46a9-a3a6-fd545c8b2c76 http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5gC5rwPOPz...
- deleted 13y ago[deleted]
- selmnoo 13y agoIt is worth noting, incidentally, that the DoD is the largest employer in the world: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_largest_employers http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_largest_employers
- icambron 13y agoWhich I think says something very sad about our national priorities.
- gizmo686 13y agoSlightly off topic, but this shutdown is one of those times where I got a very different perspective simply by reading about it from a non-US based (Al Jazeera) source. It is not that they write anything different than local sources, but the whole situation seems way sillier when I think about how this must look to people outside of the country.
- jpollock 13y agoeven funnier, the US hasn't passed a budget since '97.
- jwarkentin 13y agoMy thoughts exactly. People already make fun of our dysfunctional government. It's just adding fuel to the fire. Then again, I make fun of it too... :)
- Andrenid 13y agoAs an outsider, it is definitely seen as "entertaining", while also not really being cared about much. Just another one of those "oh America, you're so silly" moments really.
- gizmo686 13y agoYou do realize that America is a major player in the global economy. If we go down, we are taking everyone with us.
- Derbasti 13y agoProbably not as much as you seem to think. The last banking crisis originated in the US, but it didn't hit the non-US nearly as hard. In many ways, the US is actually very self-contained and in the backlash from its recent crisis, many countries have kind of separated themselves a bit. But it would be bad, yes. Though I don't hink the US would 'take down' Asia or Europe.
- 13y ago
- shirro 13y agoIsn't there anything in the US constitution to break deadlocks? In Australia if the government can't get a bill through the senate, they can try again in 3 months and if it still doesn't go through then it can be used a trigger to dismiss the house of reps and the senate and call a new election.
- jwarkentin 13y agoI think 3 months is a bit long to wait, but I'd be all for a new election.
- gizmo686 13y agoThe most the constitution has is that, in the event of a tie, the Vice President gets to have the deciding vote.
- nknighthb 13y agoNo. There is no monarch or governor general. There are no reserve powers. There is no provision for early general elections. The President is not a Prime Minister, and Congress is not a parliament. Neither is responsible to the other. The House of Representatives and the Senate can each freely block the other indefinitely. The only Constitutional mechanisms available for breaking a deadlock are Congressional elections every 2 years (entire house and 1/3rd of Senate), Presidential elections every 4 years, and the theoretical ability of 2/3rds of the states to force a Constitutional Convention to propose amendments (this has never actually happened; all Constitutional amendments have been first proposed by Congress; in either case, any amendments must be ratified by 3/4ths of states, which will never happen in the current environment where half the states would be happier destroying the country than seeing the scary black man in office for one more day).
- twoodfin 13y agowhich will never happen in the current environment where half the states would be happier destroying the country than seeing the scary black man in office for one more day OK, I'm not thrilled that this article isn't [dead] already, but regardless: This is not reddit and absurdities like that comment do not contribute to the discussion.
- yapcguy 13y agoLet's keep track of what technology related services get shut down. Please reply here. For animal lovers out there, contrary to reports, the National Zoo's PandaCam is still operational (as I type), so enjoy while you can! http://nationalzoo.si.edu/animals/webcams/giant-panda.cfm http://nationalzoo.si.edu/animals/webcams/giant-panda.cfm
- robobenjie 13y agoThis is really depressing. The system seems to be designed to be strong but not infallible, with the assumptions that the people trusted to run the government would do so competently with the best interests of the nation. It seems clear that a slow process of radicalization has replaced the interests of the nation with the interests of the party and it's unclear how to fix it. If one group defects to block voting and no compromise the other side has to also defect or be run over. This is the prisoner's dilemma writ large, only we citizens are the ones paying the penalty for dual defection.
- twoodfin 13y agoThree or four years after the last shutdown (twenty days long!) we had a budget surplus and the lowest unemployment in decades. I'm not saying those things are related, but your pessimism is probably excessive.
- wpietri 13y agoThat happened during a very strong economy. The economy now is much more vulnerable. An extended shutdown could tip the US back into recession, partly through primary effects (that is, reduced economic activity from everybody the government pays, and everybody they pay) and partly through secondary ones (e.g., consumers putting off spending and businesses deferring investment until things are more clear). Also, the threats to force a debt default along with the shutdown are dumbfounding. That would, as The Economist writes, "unleash global financial chaos". Poorly handled, it could be worse than the 2008 crisis, especially given what poor shape Europe is in right now.
- nostromo 13y agoWe all spend so much time focusing on the Federal Government but I doubt many of us will even notice the "shut down." Compare that with what would happen if your local and state governments shut down: Trash would pile up. Criminals would run free in the streets. Fires wouldn't be put out. Water and electricity would stop. Sewage systems would back up. Schools would close. We're talking about services that are the very cornerstones of modern society. It really gives you an appreciation for what the state and local governments accomplish.
- clarky07 13y agowell, this is the case for DC. Also, there are a few things you might notice. If you are house hunting hoping for a FHA loan you are screwed for now. http://www.cnn.com/2013/09/23/politics/government-shutdown-daily-life/index.html http://www.cnn.com/2013/09/23/politics/government-shutdown-d...
- singlow 13y agoOr any loan. The IRS will not be providing your lender with a tax return transcript and your closing will be delayed. I just closed on a conventional loan and the sequester already was delaying the process.
- jbooth 13y agoOne facet of the 'shutdown' is that they're not authorized to hand out federal money to states anymore. The states and municipalities are feeling it for every day that this stupid theatre persists.
- superails 13y agoThey don't hand out money everyday to the same people. And it is not stupid theater. It is our government NOT at work. We may temporarily recover some of our debt. In fact, if they keep this going for an extended period of time, it might actually help- a lot. Our country has become much too dependent on our government, and now that the two political parties can't get along, there may actually be room for another socially moderate, somewhat fiscally-conservative, deficit hawk, constitutionalist, semi-libertarian party with common sense to come along and bring the country together. Unfortunately, it hasn't organized yet (and no, it isn't the Libertarian party- not with its current leaders- and even with better leadership, Libertarians are incapable of getting the debt under control because they won't allow raising taxes to cover for past debt).
- wintersFright 13y ago[not my quote...but relevant] In essence, America has told the world that as long as the business of this country is functioning, your wealth, as represented in Marks, Yen, Pesos, etc. is backed with performing US debt. It's like saying, "as long as your neighbor, next door, does not loses his job, you will not lose all your money!
- altoz 13y agowhy is this a bad thing? less spending on something pretty much everyone agrees is bloated is bad? it's like saying morbidly obese person has slightly less access to food. every person in the media seems to assume this is a bad thing. i say this is a good thing. if we can't agree on how money should be spent, it's better that it not get spent at all.
- alexqgb 13y agoThis is retarded. There's just no other word to describe the mental deficiency big enough to render something as large, complex, and valueable as government as uniformly "good" or "bad", or as something that can intelligently be described in terms of "less" and "more" as though it were a basic commodity. On a more specific note, you have absolutly no idea what's actually happening here. I mean, I don't even know where to begin with how uninformed you are. For what it's worth, this isn't about budgeting for future expenses. This is about whether we honor the bills for expenses that were properly budgeted and legally made. The idea is that defaulting on those expenses will cause the US serious financial pain (which it will). The threat of that pain is being used to extort concessions that failed to win support in the last election. In essence, a distinct minority is using terrorist tactics to accomplish goals both opposed and formally rejected by the majority. The problem, by the way, isn't that you're totally tuned out. It's that you don't see the problem with being totally tuned out and still having an opinion anyway. There's nothing wrong with saying "I don't know what's going on so I don't know what to think." But knowing not, and knowing not that you know not is the mark of an idiot. Please, spare us.
- altoz 13y agoyep. another person that's completely bought into the media narrative of they're not playing nice, therefore it must be bad. I happen to think the popular narrative that this will end in financial disaster to be wrong. I think previous government shutdowns clearly show this narrative to be untrue. your certainty that I'm ignorant or that this is a certain disaster shows precisely how you don't get my point.
- beedogs 13y agoHow do the Republicans reckon they'll come out ahead after this? It'll be a GOP bloodbath in 2014.
- mbreese 13y agoGOP moderates will take a hit. The more conservative members that are driving this shutdown will end up strengthening their base, so they won't feel as much pressure.
- wpietri 13y agoIn addition, some theorize that the Republicans can use the chaos and votes supporting the ACA to go after vulnerable Democratic senators. And maybe I'm getting too cynical, but the extreme Republican line for years has been that government is the problem, not the solution. So I don't think the members chasing the base have the same interest in a functioning state that the rest of them do.
- jmcqk6 13y agoThis is exactly the case they are in. If you look at it from the typical tea-party perspective, they were in a win-win situation. Either get concessions on AFA, or shut down the government, which in their view is the root of the problem to begin with. I have to think this strategy will end up backfiring on them eventually, especially when you consider the long term trends in political leanings in the country, but for now, they got exactly what they wanted. I'm reminded of the dog that finally caught a car and then didn't know what to do with it.
- ubernostrum 13y agoThey feel pretty confident, because they gerrymandered the hell out of the country's electoral map in the 2010 redistricting. That's how they currently have a majority in the House: there is a significant overall preference among the voters for Democrats, but the electoral map has been drawn so as to concentrate Republican voters and break up blocs of Democratic voters, ensuring that they will have enough "safe" districts to retain control of the House at least until the 2020 redistricting.
- jonah 13y agoI hope they get it started back up soon. I was hoping to visit some National Parks later in the month. (Not being sarcastic here.) This brinkmanship is a travesty.
- avty 13y agoNow we can determine which part of government we did not miss and shut those down permanently.
- jwarkentin 13y agoHaha, exactly what I was thinking. Like the part where the IRS stops auditing...
- notdonspaulding 13y ago> Like the part where the IRS stops. There, fixed that for you.
- jwarkentin 13y agoWhoops, that's what I meant to say. Good catch!
- ck2 13y agoCosts around $50 million a day to be closed. Imagine how many people that money could help, how much health care it could buy.
- giardini 13y agoBut the savings is much, much more. And the less federal government, the better (especially in these days).
- alexqgb 13y agoI know, right? Screw those moochers at the Centers for Disease Control. Big gummint out of…uh, influenza!
- mappu 13y agoHow does that compare to how much it costs per day to be open?
- ck2 13y agoWell you get zero value for the $50 Million, so that is kind of irrelevant. Also, all these short term extensions prevents each part of the government from buying what it needs to operate in bulk, they now have to pay top dollar for small amounts. So super-dooper expensive. But that might be the plan to jack up the cost and say "look how expensive!"
- 001sky 13y ago1 trillion in red ink
- ck2 13y agoMiddle class is virtually gone, so what do you think happens when the vultures circling see that all government protection is gone from their prey? The red ink is from everything that is still running right now, ie. the military industrial complex.
- pkfrank 13y ago>The bigger issue, he [Vanguard Group Chief Economist Joseph Davis] said, is how much the turmoil raises the “Uncertainty Tax” on the U.S. economy. Policy uncertainty, Davis argues, is already keeping U.S. economic growth down around 2%, when it could be 3% a year. This is what captures my frustration as well. It's infuriating that a faction of Tea Partiers is causing such instability. Having campaigned on a promise of doing anything to stop ObamaCare, they've already played their (reckless) hand. This is bringing a hatchet where you need a scalpel; "ObamaCare" will still go into effect no matter what, and this does nothing more than score political points at the expense of the nation's health. This is precisely why people hate and subsequently tune out to politics - an unfortunate and dangerous reality.
- 001sky 13y agoIt's infuriating that a faction of Tea Partiers is causing such instability Why is growth not considered a form of instability? Just curious, last time I looked risk and volatility were agnostic to direction.
- icambron 13y agoRisk is very explicitly directional. E.g. Wikipedia has it as: > Risk is the potential of loss (an undesirable outcome, however not necessarily so) resulting from a given action, activity and/or inaction When was the last time you checked?
- 001sky 13y agoInstability is volatility (sigma). check it out. http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20100630193942AABsy3C http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20100630193942AA...
- icambron 13y agoI didn't even mention volatility or stability. I was challenging your assertion that risk was agnostic to direction. It is not.
- robomartin 13y agoI've actually had time over the past few weeks to spend time watching the various duscussions in the Senate. In other words, I chose to go to the source and take the time to understand rather than get fed a bunch of ideologically loaded bullshit by various news outfits. Here's reality: Obamacare is a complete disaster. Don't take my word for it, go research what unions are saying, what businesses are doing an go figure out what you will have to pay and what you'll get for it. This horrible law needs to be repealed. We need a budget. Apparently we have not had one since 2008 or thereabouts. I guess when you have a president who isn't even qualified to run a cookie baking operation this is what we get. It is an absolute disgrace that we are plunging this country deeper and deeper into debt. Finally, Congress has failed to provide our country with responsible governance for decades. Party affiliation does not matter here. It has devolved it into nothing less than a circus. Given that we are locked into this system of government the only conclusion one can reach is that we are doomed. This govenrment shutdown isn't a problem, no matter how much of an economic impact it might make. Over the next 25 to 50 years this economic impact will be absolutlely dwarfed by the devastation that will be caused by the layers of irresponsible actions we will have to live with. I say: Go for it! I hope people understand why it is important to take the pain now in order to right the ship for generations to come.
- Steko 13y ago"rather than get fed a bunch of ideologically loaded bullshit by various news outfits. Here's reality: <a bunch of ideological bullshit>" Take your astroturf back to Fox News.
- robomartin 13y agoHave you actually watched the debates in the House and the Senate and then compared to how they are being spun by the various TV networks? The contrast is nothing less than disgusting. Please, do it. Fox News is irrelevant. As if shooting the messenger is going to refute the argument.
- Steko 13y ago
- ars 13y agoIt seems to me that if it was illegal to combine unrelated subject into a single vote/bill government would run much smoother. No "pork" or pet projects (you'd have to vote separately on each). You could add ACA provisions to this government spending bill since they are unrelated, so there would be no shutdown. Since it's hard to define "unrelated" make it so that if 1/3 of the members vote that it's unrelated, then it's unrelated and has to voted on separately.
- deleted 13y ago[deleted]
- deleted 13y ago[deleted]
- wan23 13y agoPretty sure they would consider that an essential service that won't be shut down.
- gmuslera 13y agoYou definately don't want that all the people with such high access to basically everything digital in the world (including your credit cards and all your banks accounts, to say the least) suddently feel unsafe about getting their salary.
- shmerl 13y agoCan anyone please, explain briefly what are the downsides and practical problems that ACA will cause?
- invalidOrTaken 13y agoOne downside: it shafts young men uninsured through their employers (read: a considerable part of the HN demographic) pretty hard: http://money.cnn.com/2013/05/14/news/economy/obamacare-premiums/index.html http://money.cnn.com/2013/05/14/news/economy/obamacare-premi...
- ubernostrum 13y agoObviously it would be better to keep things as-is, with non-employer-provided insurance ranging from difficult to impossible to obtain at any price :)
- invalidOrTaken 13y agoWell, maybe it's not a downside. One could argue that young men have life on easy mode and should be the ones to bear burdens that their advantages let them handle more easily than others.
- ojbyrne 13y ago3 points: 1. those others groups with smaller percentage increases currently pay higher premiums. 2. Young men become old men. 3. Young men actually are more likely to have risky behavior that leads to them becoming old men that take money out of the system. All of these are basically part of the nature of insurance - pooling risk.
- ubernostrum 13y agoSince the basics of the ACA are identical to plans Republicans put forth multiple times over the past few decades, the downside is Republicans will be caught in the trap of being violently against something that was both A) their idea originally and B) has been shown to be quite popular among voters once they learn what it actually does. Thus the Republican party has committed to stopping implementation at all costs.
- scottjad 13y agoWhat has surprised me about this issue is how so much of the media has automatically adopted the Democrats narrative (especially on point #1, see below). Surprisingly, the media stories covering this shutdown are actually pretty fair in their summary (at least with respect to point #1). The Democrat narrative has at least three elements: (1) The House Republicans are unwilling to compromise and will shutdown the government if they can't get rid of Obamacare. (2) This will ruin the economy. (3) America should pay its bills. So much of the media has ignored the Republican narrative: (1) Senate Democrats and the President are unwilling to compromise and will shutdown the government if they can't keep all of Obamacare. (2) Excessive government spending hurts the economy. (3) Going deeper into debt is not paying ones bills. Like I said, surprisingly the latest blurbs about the shutdown actually focus on Congress as a whole not being able to compromise and come to an agreement instead of focusing only on the GOP or Tea Party.
- Steko 13y ago"So much of the media has ignored the Republican narrative:" Maybe because it's bullshit. "Congress as a whole not being able to compromise" There's no compromise being offered, this is hostage taking. As Kevin Drum said earlier today: If my neighbor threatens to steal my car, and then comes back and says he'll settle for just stealing my TV set, what kind of compromise is that? What am I getting out of the deal? http://www.motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2013/09/i-think-republicans-are-confused-about-word-compromise http://www.motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2013/09/i-think-republ...
- darkarmani 13y agoBecause the Tea Party leaders are being budget terrorists? How is taking Grover Norquist's pledge mean you are able to compromise?
- dinkumthinkum 13y agoI think you are fairly uninformed about this. Compromise on Obamacare? I don't want to be flippant but do you not know how a bill becomes a law and what it means when it is a law? The ship has sailed for all this; it is have been tested by the Supreme Court. You've got to be kidding. Shutting down the government is a pretty ridiculous ploy to whine about elections they have lost.
- scottjad 13y agoSo like 1% of the Federal government (by spending, just making this number up) is going to be closed. National parks, EPA, WIC, and Housing and Urban Dev. 99% of the federal government (by spending) will remain open, including: US Military, Food stamps, Unemployment benefits, Social Security benefits, TSA, air traffic control, border patrol, Federal Reserve, and the Post Office. http://www.npr.org/blogs/itsallpolitics/2013/09/30/227884483/the-shutdown-a-guide-to-what-would-and-wouldnt-close http://www.npr.org/blogs/itsallpolitics/2013/09/30/227884483...
- pasbesoin 13y agoWell, Obama and his Administration finally made a 4th quarter, last ditch effort -- after reading the polling tea leaves -- to appear as if they have a spine. However, I think both parties may be surprised in the next elections to find just how much in disgust the U.S. public holds them. That is, if the voters that put them there can finally remove their heads from their asses. A primary responsibility of government is a certain degree of stability and predictability. We haven't had that in years. As for the yahoos in D.C. I'm very tired of their self-serving "tantrums". Fuck them all.
- deleted 13y ago[deleted]
- mayneack 13y agoIt's not so much a rule as it is that Boehner needs to keep a majority of his party behind him in order to remain speaker. If he goes against them, they just vote for someone else. Everyone assumes that there won't be any defectors from either party in that scenario, so whoever gets the majority of the Republicans is the Speaker. A majority of the Republicans is hardly a small fraction in the grand scheme of ways things can get blocked in Congress. Committee chairs block things essentially on their own all the time.
- mayneack 13y agoI remember a couple years back reading somewhere (I tried and failed to find the article) that the Treasury Department's software wasn't actually prepared to stop the automatic generation of checks and payments if the debt ceiling was hit. This was for the first time that there was a "crisis" under Obama, so I would imagine that it's been solved.