How is the U.S. Government Shutdown IMPACTING You?

What shut down? I've noticed no change.

Perinicles wrote:

This thread is not intended to be about taking sides. Just curious about how the shutdown might be impacting your life.

Basically I have to hear about it nonstop on facebook but besides that nothing.

I'm a photographer. I have a trip scheduled to a national park to photograph the lunar eclipse the weekend of Jan 19-20. The park I need to be at is closed. I won't go if I can't get in legally (I need park ranger permission to be in this park after hours). So if I don't go, I'm out a $400 airline ticket. Plus the $bux$ I'd have made from the shot. The park is out my entry fee, a $50/hour charge for me to be there late, some hotel loses two nights of occupancy, and a car rental company loses a three day car rental. Plus meals, etc. It's a bum deal all the way around.

I am not allowed to go to work, and am not getting paid. In the short term it has been nice to run in the middle of the day, and get some stuff done around the house. If it drags on for more weeks or months, the lack of a paycheck will get annoying.

Danny Democrat wrote:

$50/hour charge for me to be there late

What park is this? I've been to many NPs over the years and never seen any such charge. In most cases your fee gives you access to the park 24/7 for anywhere from a few days to a week.

Full disclosure: I have the military America the Beautiful Pass so I never actually have to pay but I usually read the fees as I enter to see how much $ I'm saving.

Danny Democrat wrote:

I'm a photographer. I have a trip scheduled to a national park to photograph the lunar eclipse the weekend of Jan 19-20. The park I need to be at is closed. I won't go if I can't get in legally (I need park ranger permission to be in this park after hours). So if I don't go, I'm out a $400 airline ticket. Plus the $bux$ I'd have made from the shot. The park is out my entry fee, a $50/hour charge for me to be there late, some hotel loses two nights of occupancy, and a car rental company loses a three day car rental. Plus meals, etc. It's a bum deal all the way around.

No offense but why do you need to be in a park to take a picture of the moon?

What shut down? wrote:

What shut down? I've noticed no change.

+1

Nada

Danny Democrat wrote:

I'm out a $400 airline ticket.

No you're not.

Danny Democrat wrote:

I'm a photographer. I have a trip scheduled to a national park to photograph the lunar eclipse the weekend of Jan 19-20. The park I need to be at is closed. I won't go if I can't get in legally (I need park ranger permission to be in this park after hours). So if I don't go, I'm out a $400 airline ticket. Plus the $bux$ I'd have made from the shot. The park is out my entry fee, a $50/hour charge for me to be there late, some hotel loses two nights of occupancy, and a car rental company loses a three day car rental. Plus meals, etc. It's a bum deal all the way around.

Sounds bogus, Mr. democrat.

Theres nobody there to stop you from doing whatever...

I'm in the DC area.

Many of my friends are federal workers; it's hard on them. I don't know anyone who is financially struggling yet, but it's hard for other reasons - it's not a vacation - more like jury duty, where you have to check each day to see if you have to come in.

And their work deadlines are not extended as a result of the shutdown, and their ongoing work is piling up - my friends who are non-essential would, for the most part, prefer to be allowed to work without pay so that they could at least stay on top of deadlines.

The bathrooms on most of my running routes are padlocked (this one really hurts, trust me). One of my preferred locations for road workouts (Hains Point) is supposedly closed, with uniformed officers ordering people to turn around rather than enter (though they're not there all the time, and it's easy to hop the gate).

Many of the local DC races are on NPS property, and so could be cancelled if the shutdown continues.

Traffic is much lighter than normal; metro noticeably uncrowded.

The gym has not been packed at 6:30 am, despite it being resolution season - I suspect that this is because a lot of people are hitting the gym mid-day since they're not working.

NotAPhotographerBut wrote:

Danny Democrat wrote:

I'm a photographer. I have a trip scheduled to a national park to photograph the lunar eclipse the weekend of Jan 19-20. The park I need to be at is closed. I won't go if I can't get in legally (I need park ranger permission to be in this park after hours). So if I don't go, I'm out a $400 airline ticket. Plus the $bux$ I'd have made from the shot. The park is out my entry fee, a $50/hour charge for me to be there late, some hotel loses two nights of occupancy, and a car rental company loses a three day car rental. Plus meals, etc. It's a bum deal all the way around.

No offense but why do you need to be in a park to take a picture of the moon?

Sure, good question. No one needs to go anywhere to point a camera at the sky and take a photo of the moon, at least when it's high in the sky. But those photos aren't of my interest anyway and no one will pay you for them.

The best moon photos are shot from low angles, with very large lenses. They incorporate mountains, sand dunes, cityscapes, whatever.

I had to take a dump at a trailhead (after running 3.5 hours) and the gov't locked up the crapper. If you lock up all the crappers, where do you think people are going to take a dump?

Doesn't seem very smart to me. What's the worst that can happen to a pit crapper in the middle of the woods? Even if somebody stole all the toilet paper, I had my own.

The coast guard is handling this well. The tip sheet they had up for furloughed workers had some great ideas like having yard sales and babysitting to make up for lost pay. Also, they said not to worry about your credit score. More important stuff to worry about. I’m sure things are going swimmingly for the ~1M federal employees not getting paid who make less than $60k a year.

Not, so far.

Furloughed worker here, and this being letsrun expect nothing but vitriol and hate from the trolls.

Hey we do a job and it’s important for the nation, its future, and the economy.

I’m ok for another month but have to pull money from an account I didn’t want to touch. Have other options if this goes on but will require red tape and fees, so it’s a hassle. Have had to reconsider race travel plans next month until further notice. Drop dead date in about four weeks.

I’ve put a lot into 401Ks in previous work and could access that but it would have costs and penalties. So taking this one week and one step at a time.

Agree with above assessment that it is not a vacation. It’s unpleasant and stressful because we don’t know if it’s going to be days, weeks, or months. Or if draconian emergency powers are utilized, maybe permanent. This is also demoralizing. Will sit it out for now but might start looking for new work if things don’t improve in a month.

Every fast food restaurant across the 5 states I travelled last week are looking for help.

What's the federal minimum wage up to now?

My wife is currently doing contract software testing for a federal research center and might not have a contract after mid February.

I work for the great state of California’s state forest program. We have a laugh about it

I want lazy ass government employees to suffer.

They do nothing.

They are nothing.