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Sequestration - It's Just Beginning
Evidence of the sequester remains elusive. The warning signs that we track closely – initial jobless claims, Richmond Fed, personal income and payrolls – do not show any material deterioration that we can attribute to the sequester. One mystery is why personal income of government workers has not contracted, as fewer hours worked should equal less pay. The answer, BofAML notes, is simple - it's just beginning...
Close to a million federal employees have been told that they will be furloughed for several days this year, but the number that has actually started to take furlough days is quite low.
We expect aggregate government worker income to decline in May given that furloughs started in late May.
The first day of government wide furloughs was on May 24, when roughly 115,000 federal workers, or 5% of the total federal work force, stayed home without pay.
However, with the majority of the furloughs not kicking in until the beginning of July, including the Pentagon’s 680,000 furloughs beginning July 8, the real income shock will not show up until the July personal income and outlay report on August 30.
Source: BofAML
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Fuck Furloughs.......Fire these cocksuckers .....so we can see instant results
Agreed. I'm sick of these parasites who go around calling themselves "heroes" and "first responders". Repair the potholes and take up my trash, motherfuckers.
I'm as sick of the bloated federal government as the next guy, but 1) firefighters are not federal employees, and 2) rather than slam people who actually do something useful (even if you disagree about who pays for it), can we start with the IRS and the Dept of Homeland Security and the NSA and the DOD and then work our way down?
P.S. And get rid of the Fed (not a government entity, but it would save us all a shit ton of tax money).
They're taking a furlough from fucking off at the office all day long.
How about the Department of Education & HHS?
Agree on Education -- the states can do that just fine. HHS has some value and I wouldn't get rid of it. A lot of old people would literally die for lack of health care if we did away with it over night.
The federal government taxing the young (taking their administrative cut for salaries & pensions) and soon picking & choosing which of the old will live or die is the problem, not the solution.
HHS does many things under its umbrella of "customer service".
Why can't the individual states decide how best to care for old people who are impoverished or without family just like educating the young?
To my way of thinking, we can cut out the federal "middle man".
Reduction ad absurdam. The states are, well, states, or at governments. They are only any less morally degenerate than their federal master for simple lack of opportunity/means. Without the federal government, the states would be free to become as tyrannical as they please, jockeying for the position currently occupied by the federal government, essentially.
It is purely a difference of degree, there is no difference in kind. Please stop applying this frankly asinine double-standard. The states have plenty of evil deeds to answer for as it is, giving them more power, as with any government or state, is not a solution to too much state power. The core fallacy of all statists who don't admit that their intent is malicious is that the state can, at least hypothetically, be used to good ends. It is at best a grossly disingenuous argument, at worst a despicably calllous lie, and, either way, not true.
Your last sentence really says it all, unintentionally, no doubt. Why be tyrannized by apex-sociopaths 1000 miles away when you've got the penultimate-sociopaths 100 miles away?
Just another morally bankrupt statist, eagerly awaiting the 10,000,000th configuration of state power which will surely be nothing those before it because... *silence*
people have more influence on tyrans 100 miles away
a state is the best configuration possible for you are ruled by people not too far away and are strong enough to keep your neighbours states from invading you
about sequestration if you want to save money you have to stop paying for the most unuseful of your spendings : the debt
Send the power back to the states and cut off the spigot.....simple as that.
The furloughed workers get unemployment while out and will get back pay when they return.....little economic impact.
You can always move to another state that is run in a way that you approve of. You cannot escape the federal government.
Ummm...?
Which state is run in a way in which i approve of?
Any factor which is a drag on competetiveness will be raced to the bottom between states if it can be ... there is a good case to be made that distribution of welfare should be largely left to the states, but the taxation to pay for it needs to be at a federal level.
We wouldn't want old people to die now. That would just be wrong.
Cant remember the third dept that should be eliminated there, Gov. Perry?
Clever, there's more than just three, you'll exhausted long before you hit "F & U" ;-)
http://www.usa.gov/directory/federal/index.shtml
Oh you dont have to tell me, I'd get rid of at least half!
Oh jeez, its way worse than I thought. How about 90% of those on the first "A" page alone?
There are very few things we need a federal government for. The issue is this and I hope people realize it and take it for what its worth.
The more complicated a "thing" is, the more corrupt it becomes. Adding another agency/law/bureaucracy every year complicates the "thing" until one arrives at the point the "thing" is unrecognizable to the intent of the "thing" proposed.
1)Military/defense
2)Justice system
3)Public works
4)Minimal public assistance programs
Funny, I actually believe that the argument could be made for socialized medicine under the auspice of public safety.
To your point about adding laws and bureaucracy: Perusing MSM, you can see pundits complaining and describing congress as 'do nothing' if they arent passing relatively many new laws. The implication being of course that more laws are always better. Ugh.
just a small taste from the menu:
Oh Christ....
Love your idea of the United States as a third world country.
LTER I have cops, firefighters, teachers etc retiring around me all the time at age 53 with a final salary of 140k. They get a pension anywhere between 75k and 125k (about 75% of the cops and firefighters get theirs tax free due to "disability". the free healthcare they have had all their life remains free. so if they fart and it smells funny they see 3 general practicioners and 2 specialists about it.
suggest that they could probably get by on half that, which is still better than the average private worker, and they will try to have you whacked.
I can't speak for everywhere else, but by me, it is so rigged it rivals the stock market.
I'll go along with the idea that their retirement packages are too sweet and should be reigned in, but I would focus more on why the private sector pales in comparison. The private sector is being fucked up the ass by the same people who want to take what's left of the middle class (government workers).
It's gone man. the whole fucker needs to reset. the whole thing.
I think it is going to reset whether I want it to or not, because it's been drained by the oligarchs to the point where it cannot sustain. But the problem isn't having decently paid police and firefighters. We could have that and much more and barely pay federal taxes.
P.S. I also think it is going to reset only for those portions of government that provide useful services such as firefighters. The guys who work in the underground bunkers and who push the "buy" button at the Fed will get raises no matter how bad it gets. That is always the model of collapsing empire. Keep the enforcers wealthy.
Let Them Eat Ayn Rand ! (her books .... not her pussy, jeeesh ?) You don't have to advocate for the scum .... they've got their own in house lawyers .... CONGRESS !
"Keep the enforcers wealthy." Yea, and destroy the system from within while you extract every morsal of blood and sweat from peeps that work their asses off (like me) for years and barely make it to 75K, then HOPE the 401k is not confiscated by the rats in Congress, or devalued by the stock market.
Yep - I just look it as going to a movie or a play. Laugh at the funny points at they squirm trying to get out of it or gasp in amazement as they start applying haircuts. The whole thing is so bloody ridiculous now.
Happens though when you have 5 bills and little to no money to pay them.
Most of us have 403b retirement, which means we fund our own retirement. I love science that's why I do what I do for zero pay increase 6 of the last 10 yrs. Be my guest live on a mountain building an asteroid seeker camera and tell me how rich I am.
That which can't be sustained won't be, and those pensions are unsustainable. Those you speak of are state or county or city employees, and those entities do not have a printing press. Sooner or later they will not be able to borrow the money for those expenditures and you can't squeeze blood out of a taxpayer turnip (though I'm sure they will try). The more they raise taxes the less actual tax they will bring in. I think by the time this is all over there are going to be a great many disappointed people and its not a good thing to disappoint a cop. They turn surly and vendictive. They will probably start their own protection rackets and take up armed robbery, maybe compete with gangs for turf.
you must be in cali
Spyker Speed makes a good point: there is IMHO a quite deliberate and not-so-subtle pattern of equating "first responders" and "heroes" with generic government enforcement agents and the military.
I recall very distinctly an image from the aftermath of the Newtown shooting: three "first reponders" - fire department guys from the look of their gear - were standing in a line and saluting. Since when do fireman at an active emergency scene form up in a row and SALUTE... for the cameras?
Having a negative reaction to, for instance, a criminal investigator from the IRS, or a wet-boy from the CIA, is like spitting on a firefighter. Be very ashamed of yourselves, all ye vicious antisocial troglodytes. You hate America, and kick puppies.
If fire fighters and first responders want to be thought of as different .... they should come out for us .... they are very comfortably ensconced in the give away !
many firefighters get paid more than fed workers and it comes from the tax payers. CA cities facing BK because of over paying firefighters, law enforcement and other public employees. they also can retire young and some receive almost full salaries in retirement
Think he means the guys in the white moon suits.
Firefighters have become excessive. Volunteers firefighters and volunteer fire company's can return (as they once did) to displace huge salary & pension expense. The grandious firehouses in many communities are a testament to excessive spending IMO.
Isn't the sequester dollar amount like less than 2% of the budget or something like that?
Here's a possible solution........ eliminate the paid day off.
How much would be saved by all governments (Fed, State, local) if people didn't get paid for not working?
Why won't that happen? Because it's important to demonize the Republicans and blame them so the little guy who votes has to feel as much pain as possible to build up a great resentment for the Red Team.
Blue Team is your friend. Free cell phones. Red Team Bad.
>> it's important to demonize the Republicans
Were you under the impression the Repubs were blameless in the national clusterfuck?
It has nothing to do with demonizing one side more than the other. Both sides are demonized by the other side, to keep the sheep thinking along party lines and blaming the other guy. You're smarter than to be one of those guys.
Gents:
I appreciate the comments but please note, I was remarking on a well publicised political strategy and neither promoting nor defending the Red Team.
You are buying into a meme intended to be devisive. If we are fighting amongst ourselves over our prefered red or blue team, our conservative/progressive we are that much less able to present a united front that is able to effect any sort of real change if that is even possible now. I personally believe we are going to ride this sucker all the way down. Politics is theater. Pinning your hopes to a political candidate or party is futile. Ask anyone who was passionate about Obama and plumb the depths of their disapointment when they discovered that he was just a more articulate version of George Bush. I'm sure there was a smooth transition of power, as those in charge didn't change, only the suit in point position.
Yep - apparently theonly State/Government jobs they can cut are the Teachers, Policemen, Firemen, etc.
I'm a self employed doctor and I'm sick of being milked as you are... but I have patients in almost all levels of government, and they're unhappy too. We've all been lied to.
You must live very far from me.
LOL!!!
/not really...
If they voted for Obama and a congressional democrat, they are then getting what they deserve
Please, as if we are being given an actual choice. We are given a carefully selected and approved red candidate and a carefully selected and approved blue candidate, and aren't they pretty? Don't they have great hair? Both are the same, only differing on minor and meaningless issues, such as abortion and gay marriage. Even the presidential offerings have to be interviewed and approved by Rothschild. What we've got is the illusion of choice rather than the substance of it. Our elections are about as meaningful as those farces they used to hold in the former Soviet Union or the ones Sadam Hussein used to hold or Juan Peron.
As opposed to what, rightwingerism. I've been voting third party since the seventies.
Hell it would probably cost a million each to fire them, 20% sue for racial and age discrimination for another million and then they all go on disability and triple dip with .gov benes, food stamps and social security
I can confirm that, as a friend has received his furlough notice. He says it starts mid July into September for 11 days.
"The U.S. Department of Labor (DOL) is helping furloughed federal workers collect unemployment benefits, which is probably not what lawmakers had in mind when they implemented furloughs to reduce towering government debt.
http://www.moneynews.com/Economy/furlough-federal-workers-unemployment/2013/05/31/id/507296
Ya see there... this whole thing is like string theory with black holes at the sites where the strings overlap. If you have worm holes weaving in and out of each other, you will have a model for both governmental and banker accounting. You thought "off shore" meant an account in the the Cayman Islands or something. No. It's simmering at the bottom of a dark pool, in an alternate reality, hiding from this reality and it's consequences. But they should fear all of these worm holes intersecting and overlapping, it will create a vacuum in which anti-matter will enter this universe, you know, to balance out all the CDSs and MBSs that have no mortgages, assets, or counter parties to back them. The result should be quite explosive. Said another way, this is why this economy SUCKS!!!!!
Tell it M'Lady!
My sis works for DoL and my girl for HHS. Sis was supposed to get furloughed for the 20 days that everyone else was, but it was cut down to 5 days, no biggie. While I am obviously biased towards my sister having a job, what she actually does is a complete joke, not her actual job, but the program that sucks in and doles out tons of our tax dollars. If it was up to me, she and her $90+k (shes relatively young and hasnt been there that long, so in the future ceteris paribus [hah!] she will be making much more with the correlating ridiculous pension) job would be eliminated in a heartbeat. Thankfully my girl was uneffected.
DoL? Dept of Labor? And she makes $90k+? Damn it all to hell. Do you know what people that work their asses off every day make a year? I must have fucked up something somewhere, sometime..
We're in the DC burbs, its best you not know. Seriously.
I run a small business, and she makes way more than me, and more than the owner.
1st welfare program to take a deserved hit
The gimmick is that "essential" personell will probably take sick leave, vacation, or a personal day off.
Cut the crap and give 1 in 5 a month off without pay, that would be a start.
What you really want to do is give 5 of 5 the rest of their life off on Wall Street
Government pay .... social services .... you can't trust the liars in chief .... the payroll and welfare check is just the walking around money .... they cover up all the bennies, overtime, petty cash, office party allowances, travel, hotel, restaurant, incidentals, time off, lenient and generous sick leave, gorgeous vacations, gorgeous retirements ............OLIGARCHY OF THE PUBLIC SERVANTS .... PLANET OF THE APES ...... NO ONE HAS A GRIP ON PUBLIC COMPENSATION, NEPOTISM AND LARGESE ..... it's CorzineCity ! I heard that IRS bitch .... that took the 5th .... was pulling down $750 K .... they are in a different world .... la la land .... they will have to be liquidated .... they are tainted human beings .... who could never endure the rigors of real work .... and citizen's paltry compensation .... due to high taxes .... filth .... human debris .... cancer ! When they don't work .... they cost even more .... they are a double edged razor blade in your rectum .... every time you move them .... you bleed more .... wake the fuck up ! We need Caterpillar to design a wood chipper .... as big as a blimp hangar .... to start mulching them ! They are making me get in touch with my inner Hitler .... not to get innocent Joos and Gypsies .... these fucks DESERVE a final solution !
Mulch em, mix em with fresh cut grass and then compost them Bitchez !!!
For the first time, they would finally being doing something useful...
Monedas will appoint Hulk as Secretary of Agriculture .... if he would be so gracious and civic minded as to accept !
I accept !!! But for the children's sake, I think we will just dump the political compost on Fukashima...
Great ! If you want an easier job .... you could get on all fours .... and be our conference table ?
No way man, I'm tickllish and you wouldn't like me very much when I'm laughing hysterically !!!
I wouldn't like it if you spilled my booze ! Picking the whole cabinet is gonna be fun !
"We need Caterpillar to design a wood chipper .... as big as a blimp hangar .." Nice visual. Then we can serve .gov tartare
Furlough them for the rest of the year.
.
Or even longer.
Scamquester is a diversion
The globalist will endear the same fear as being caught in a spider hole. Recently, we can laugh at the same methods used during Benghazi. We only laugh, when they laughed over a killing spree victory. How is the new Central Bank development program working out for you?
Libya’s high oil income stifles commercial bank lending to the private sector – IMF Working Paper
http://www.imf.org/external/pubs/ft/wp/2013/wp1392.pdf
Just how are those new high interest poverty loans working out IMF? You do realize people are becoming cognizant?
Can’t tell you how it will close, but I think they may use your identical measures instilled on countries you overthrew for the Bank of International Settlements benefit.
How confident do you feel your success rate will be?
With a 1+ trillion dollar deficit being a yearly ho-hum, gov't is a metastatic cancer that is devouring our society's productive capacity - the amount of money that goes into the shitter is mind-boggling...
We have part time friends that are both in civil service that own a beautiful house and take week vacations to Europe all the time. How the fuck do they do that?
Are you kidding?
1. They are grotesquely overpaid.
2. They are grotesquely underworked.
How about a permanent furlough for those fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan?
The savings in pay, pensions, medical cover, funerals, widows pensions, weapon and ammunition consumption.....would add up to quite bit.
As with the failure of most economic enterprises it has less to do with the total amount spent than the misallocation of spending. The US government does spend a lot, but mostly it just spends money in ways that are wrong, immoral, unethical and illegal.
Spot on. One just has to loook at how little is spent on actual governance (which includes the courts, education, etc) to realise that government exists only for certain vested interests who maintain power by doling out bread, circuses and hope to the have nots which they often helped create in the first place.
Peter, the govt will find a way to waste money no matter what area they throw it at.....they throw billions at education and this country has a rapidly declining educational system...........again you have to remember that the military spending has always been in furtherance of extracting the wealth and resources from other nations to keep our standards higher.....that gig is up.......they can no longer effectively extract and exploit enough to maintain the standards.....so they are now resorting to monetizing to survive......won't work.....we are in the 7th inning........stretch........
"The US government does spend a lot,"...lol.............the most UN-FUCKING-PRODUCTIVE ENTITY IN THE WORLD.
Before Rome fell the state was entertaining its people with all kind of games. I guess that same entertainment is now called "reality shows". The economy broken and bankrupt.
Go see if you can get a free meal at the Capitol Cafeteria ? You'd be lucky to get a glass of water .... touring the Obammy WH ! Occupy Wall Street ? Every time you have business in a government office .... faint .... let them call an ambulance .... maybe you'll get a snack if you go to the hospital .... let's shut these fuckers down !
Great posts here. Fuck all these useless parasitic gov't workers
Death to the scum (political death) .... the hole licking filth .... civil disobedience on a massive scale .... maybe we won't have to use our weapons .... we the workers .... have never been more oppressed .... and by our own socialist saviours .... God, the irony .... there's no going back .... once this get's started ! I want to see all government clerks .... working for tips .... for quick and courteous service .... that'll get their attention ! Forward to victory .... we'll forward a revolution right up the "Nigger's" ass ! (protected political speech .... offensive words in quotes .... as they do not reflect on the magnanimity and humanity of the author) (I reserve the right to amend or edit my comments .... if I feel they are being mis-understood)
There is a boogie man in your closet, Monedas, but it isn't a socialist or a nigger.
Am I being watched ? I hat tipped you .... even though I not sure what you mean .... you mean I have some dark inner self .... my "inner nigger" .... I am a very sympathetic guy .... you'd probably buy me a beer .... if we met in a pub !
Monedas
Just relax. We all know the shock you’re going thru, we all have gone through the same growing pains. I too was an absolute mess in 2001, couldn’t believe [almost] everything taught was a fucking lie. Just start asking questions, you have a huge resource group on ZH. Again, unwind & behave!
OK, here's a question .... when did you stop beating your wife ? I'm not as mad as I sound .... I sense weakness in the administration .... I smell blood .... it's time to put the pressure on .... but, I'm lovin' it .... send in the clowns .... me so happy .... I could kiss a "nigger" !
Not married, strike one!
Private citizens should have the right .... to slap impertinent public servants .... police .... before they address you .... as a citizen .... must present you with their "business card" .... so you can report them .... or recommend them !
BitRevolution .... financed by BitCoins ! LOL
They are happy since they will collect unemployment
I find this strange. Will these unemployment payments not be clawed back at tax time?
Here we have a maximum annual earnings before unemployment payments must be repaid.
So if someone earns more than 40k a year they are not entitled to keep payments, and it goes on a graduated scale to about 15k where they keep all the payments.
You can't collect unemployment unless your furloughs are contiguous for at least a week. A day a week does not count. Only a few union workers in Norfolk shipyards are being allowed to take contiguous furlough days.
But the various federal unions will win backpay at the upcoming grievance/arbitration dance. They always do.
The only ones really affected were the White House Docents and they probably went to work for the IRS ... Where is Andrew Jackson when we need him
Most Federal employees I know are pretty smart and quite honest about their jobs. If you ask them how their jobs contribute to society they laugh. Most don't think they're contributing anything at all. They do like the pay, retirement, and job security, however.
That has been my experience, excepting those that carry guns.
The real inflation rate (9% per shadow stats) and a budget that increases only 3-4% has got to be hurting those bastards.
Baseline Budgeting guarantees an almost 8% increase every year. The sequester just reduced the increase in spending by a gnats butt or nothing at all after the backroom deals.
Goverment employee's pay no taxes. Think about it any taxes they pay simply prefund their next paycheck. When Goverment is small and targeted to specific essenstial tasks then this does not present a problem. But as goverment expands and employee's are hired to dig holes while others goverment employee's are paid to fill those holes thats when you have a problem.
I'm still waiting for Obama to take credit for the sequestration, it was after all his idea, the RINOS and Teapublicans just called his bluff.
Furloughs will be surprisingly correlated to various holidays , hunting seasons, and sports play offs like the world series and the super bowl. They are all over paid and need more time off to spend their largess.
Usually the furloughs will be on Fridays, so everyone gets a 3 day weekend.
I am going to be doing deferred maintainence on my house on most furlough fridays. Most people I know will do the same. It should help the revenue of the local Lowe's and Home Depot a tiny bit.
Meanwhile, in DC: "Urgency on debt fades with big issues unsolved"(WaPo link)
Some in CONgress are thinking their work is done...
The post office is in a financial bind. Our government is so union controlled they cannot even cut out Saturday mail delivery.
This is how determined the Federal government to maintain increases in spending.
Watch then cut hours and boost pay. A net zero.
More failure games. Benny and the inkjects just print us another $10 trillion dollars and everything will be fine.
"government wide furloughs"
What you have is a population that are going to be working a shorter week on average. In one comment 11 days, well that is 1/4 of a day per week less for every week of the the year. Just the beginning in the 70's all the talk here was a 3 day week so that is only a fraction of what you will end up needing. A first step give it 12 months and do it again so it is half a day for every week next year etc. etc. Government cannot apply a 3 day week (although it probably needs too) because there would be revolt so it does it by stealth and hopes those it affects don't notice however the outcome is the same.
Fire their asses and don't replace them. Let them experience what's going on out here in realityland.
I live in DC near a bunch of these gov firms...traffic patterns have been spooky weird with certain mondays and fridays having half traffic or less.
The other thing that gets me is last friday going to get something to eat at around 2 pm before going back to work, and the roads are completely crushed with people going home. What a goddamn joke, paid to do nothing by the taxpayers and they're working a 30 hour week. The sequester is basically free money for the tax payers, none of these folks would have done shit that day anyway.
this slows the economy = more QE
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Your going to need to hold off on this 'sequester' hysteria.
The sequester is a cut in GROWTH not a cut in SPENDING.
Government employee payroll totals will NOT be less in 2013 than 2012.
All this does is push more cash to the same government workers for less time on the job, and fewer 'products'. They all got an hourly pay raise, and extra time off the job.