Every few years, it seems like it’s another time to talk about how the government shut down affects our life. It started in 2011 and I wrote about it next when it happened in 2013.
A government shut down is a weird situation for most families of government workers.
We have a weird situation put on top of a weird situation.
My wife is active duty, but she has a position that is generally held by government worker. Because she’s active duty she has to work even when the government shuts down. At the same time, there’s often no guarantee if she’s going to get paid. Finally, she’s often becomes the division leader as the highest ranking official.
Everything’s generally confusing when there’s a government shut down. You’d think there would be a solid plan in place because it seems to happen often enough. Nope. It’s not easier that this happens over the weekend when most people aren’t work anyway. The most confusing of all is that my wife’s special case slips through the cracks.
There are so many questions. Are troops getting paid? (It seems like they might not be.) Does my wife count as being part of those troops? (Sometimes yes, sometimes no.) Is the office building going to be open or is she going to drive 2 hours to a locked door? Will the shutdown be over in a couple of hours or we plan for the long haul? (Who knows.) Can Tom Brady fix this? (Probably. Who would doubt his ability?)
So far it looks like my wife is still going to be paid. That’s a big one for us, because she’s the breadwinner. We found out that she won’t be the division leader this time, which is fine by me. (I don’t want to get into why she isn’t, but I feel it is a little controversial.)
It’s a very confusing time (Did I use the word “confusing” before? It’s confusing. Confusing.) However, it does seem like we are starting to get some answers. I know that a lot of people have had enough with politics, so I’m trying to put those thoughts aside. I will say that I spent much more time than I would like to reading all the updates and bickering. I should be focusing my attention to other tasks, but I can’t seem to help it.
I realize that this article is a little light on the “money” and high on the “politics”, but government shutdowns can be a real personal finance situation for us and we can’t be alone there. Tomorrow, maybe I’ll get to a real investing article. Let’s hope it doesn’t blow up on me like my recent GE article.