A lot of banks/credit unions offer 0% loans to federal employees during government shutdowns. Some of them even offer this to customers who join after the shutdown began.
Granted, it is weird to think about living in a country where this is a finanical product that so many institutions just have.
Even without that, the shutdown actually needs to last a while before it actually becomes a problem for forloughed workers.
Despite the shutdown, the October 1 paychecks (covering work done between September 7 and September 20) will still go out, as they have long since been sent to the payment processors.
The October 15 paychecks (covering September 21 - October 4) should go out with a slightly reduced amount the unpaid 4 days during the shutdown. This would require the agency in question to properly follow shutdown protocols and submit timecards/payroll data to the processors prior to the shutdown. Since this is not the routine process, I imagine some mistakes will be made here, so some government workers will probably miss the October 15 paycheck. Others may face hardship from the reduced payment; but even people living paycheck to paycheck typically stretch the paycheck out across the pay period, so will be able to get through most of the period on the reduced check (and can probably defer/reduce some spending).
Major payroll lapses will not kick in until the October 29 paycheck. If we reach that point, this would be the second longest shutdown in history [0]. Even then, most Americans have an existing line of credit that offers 0% interest loans for between 30 and 60 days depending on when they are in the billing cycle [1].
[0] Not that I would be too suprised by this. The longest shutdown occured under President Trump, while the republicans controlled the Senate; and had controll of the House for the first part of the shutdown.
[1] Except for those who have a revolving balance, in which case and additional spending starts accruing interest immedietly; and any delay in paying down the existing balance also incurs interest. And, when these loans do gather interest, it is at a quite high rate.
> Granted, it is weird to think about living in a country where this is a finanical product that so many institutions just have.
I suppose it's like working for a company with a really weird build or CI/CD process that breaks regularly, to the point where many devs in the company have a prepared "the build process broke again" workaround script ready.
People are generally pretty intelligent, au least until they get into politics
I'm really tired of band-aiding solutions and not properly addressing the core issues behind the broken everything. Broken windows, and we're running out of duct tape.
You don't think people with the planning skills and intelligence to real-time coordinate and sequence air traffic have the skills to foresee an impending event and start planning, coordinating and sequencing their personal responses to that event?
You seem to be interpreting assertions of fact as some sort of approval for the current state of things.
The commenter above is saying that ATCs by and large are probably not living paycheck to paycheck. He isn't saying that the shutdown is super neat.
Further up, I was clarifying that ATCs will get paid once the shutdown ends, which is a world of difference from the other way to interpret "they aren't getting paid". Likewise I am not making a value judgement about the situation, I am trying to be helpful.
>You seem to be interpreting assertions of fact as some sort of approval for the current state of things.
You seem to be ignoring the human element of the situation in lieu of pushing the logistics of it. Something the GP was directly combatting.
No, the airlines aren't shutting down. We're further weakening the stability that will lead to the next major crash, though. Be it literal or otherwise.
If me pointing out that furloughed employees receive back pay requires that I couch it in explicit sympathy for their situation, we're doomed to talk about peripheral issues.
I agree, we're doomed. Yes, I see even in this post I see people cheering on the closing of hospitals and the burdens of workes increasing just because billionaires don't want to pay taxes. So I can't by default assume that "they'll get backpay anyway it doesn't matter" isn't uyet another dismissal.
