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comment by Cortez
Cortez  ·  4182 days ago  ·  link  ·    ·  parent  ·  post: Countdown To Shutdown: 6 Days

Can someone explains what a Government Shutdown means?





b_b  ·  4182 days ago  ·  link  ·  

I think it's hard to say whether it will directly impact most people who don't work for the government (but that is a lot of people, upwards of 2 million). "Essential" functions remain, which means that military, border patrol, food inspectors, mailmen, air traffic controllers, etc, will all still be working, although they don't get a paycheck during the shutdown. Non-essential staff will be furloughed without pay, which only directly affects you if, say, you were planning on visiting a national park, getting a passport processed, or applying for a small business loan, for example (at the lab in which I work, we are planning to submit several grant application to the NIH; I'm sure that will be on hold). Most people won't do those things for the short time the government will be offline. But I think that (a) because hundreds of thousands of people will be suddenly out of work, and (b) there will be a general sense of panic, that this will impact the economy negatively. In that sense, it may have an indirect impact on all of us.

Cortez  ·  4182 days ago  ·  link  ·  

Interesting, what does this mean for schools?

b_b  ·  4182 days ago  ·  link  ·  

Probably not that much, beyond not having access to any Department of Education resources. They are mostly funded at the state and local level, I believe.

Cortez  ·  4182 days ago  ·  link  ·  

I don't even believe they rely on the Department of Education often at all anyway.