The Debt of the Shutdown - Sarah Seeliger

The Debt of the Government Shutdown


Sarah Seeliger
Mr. Roddy
IHSS
29 January 2019
The Debt of the Government Shutdown
The article I read was about one of the consequences of the recent government shutdown. The article stated that the five - week shutdown costs the U.S. 11 million dollars (New York Times). A quarter of the money that is owed now was lost for good (New York Times). These figures are the first conclusive calculations effects that the longest government shutdown in history has on our economy,and  the current cost of the shutdown is double the 5.7 billion dollars Donald Trump asked for in order to build his wall (New York Times). A lot of the lost money will enter back into the economy after people start getting paid again, but there’s a lot of damage that cannot be fixed, meaning that the effects of the shutdown will remain (New York Times). The government is going to be running as normal for three weeks, but Trump has cautioned that he will shutdown the government again if his requirements for his border wall aren’t fulfilled (New York Times).
The suffering economy has had significant effects on government workers (New York Times). An example of someone suffering  would be Kelly Spencer, who is a federal contractor. Because she was not paid during the five week shutdown and isn’t receiving back pay, she isn’t able to buy a home (New York Times). There are other people who are receiving back pay, but have to make serious changes to their spending habits (New York Times). Tamara Brown, a State Department employee, says she no longer feels comfortable spending her money the  way she used to (New York Times).

Analysis

This article contributes a lot to the study of economics. It gives us a good look at how one bad government decision can affect the economy and everyone living in a country. It also shows us how much the economy is intertwined with the government. This article is important because it gives us a comprehensive look at what is going on with the economy at the current moment as well as a good look into what could happen in the future as far as U.S. economy goes.
After reading the article and thinking about it a bit, I realized that it brought up some questions I hadn’t thought about before. One question the article brought to my mind is how could the government have dealt with the situation of building a wall better in order to prevent a shutdown like this? Another question I had after reading the article is how could we make the economy stronger so that if there does happen to be another shutdown, there won’t be as much debt and not as much money will be lost?
Although I had questions at the end of this article, it did answer some questions I find to be more pressing and important than the ones that I had. The first of three important  questions this article engaged was this: just how much money was lost? A second question that was answered throughout reading this article was how much money will the government be able to gain back, and how much of it is lost forever? The third and final important question answered was as follows: how will government workers be affected by the loss of money caused by this recent shutdown?





Works Cited
Rappeport, Alan, and Binyamin Appelbaum. “Government Shutdown Cost U.S. Economy $11 Billion, C.B.O. Says.” The New York Times, The New York Times, 28 Jan. 2019, www.nytimes.com/2019/01/28/us/politics/shutdown-cost-us-economy-11-billion-cbo-says.html.

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