How will the shutdown affect the NMC?
From the website it appears that it’ll shut down but that wasn’t written plainly.
How will it also affect the paperwork in the federal bureaucracy in West Virginia?
Everyone of us here has probably bitterly complained every five years or so about the cost of renewing our licenses. But in this case, the fees do have an upside. The cost for running the NMC are covered from the fees that are paid by Mariners, rather than Congressional appropriations. Add to that the fact that the blue suitsers that provide leadership of the civilians are automatically exempt from the furlough, and I think that the shutdown should have minimal effects. But given the perpetually slow service even under the best conditions, don’t get your hopes too high.
The Coast Guard, and every other agency that collects user fess, doesn’t keep the money it collects in fees. User fees go to the U.S. government “general fund,” and the Coast Guard still gets its money, all of it, through the annual Coast Guard appropriations act.
Military Coast Guard are not being furloughed, but the evaluators at NMC are all civilians. I don’t know specifically who may por may not be furloughed at the NMC, but at CG HQ staff were told that all civilians in the Prevention Policy Directorate (CG-5P) would be furloughed. NMC is part of CG-5P.
Are you referring to that red banner strip at the top of the page? That only means exactly what it says, the web site won’t be maintained. The same banner is on every Coast Guard web site, including the home page for the whole of the Coast Guard.
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When NMC takes months to process an application and nearly a year to process a request for reconsideration, It doesn’t seem like a few weeks of government shutdown should make much difference.
My biggest complaint is that federal employees will ultimately be paid for staying home. They should have to go home and apply for unemployment just like the rest of us. Since they know they will ultimately get paid they should stay on the job and keep working. If they don’t stay and keep working, they should not be paid for the days that they don’t work.
The President should announce a two week unpaid layoff for most nonessential employees whether Congress passes a CR or not. This would save a lot of money. For Example, if the Department of Education was shutdown entirely for two weeks, few taxpayers would even notice it. Most operations of several other federal agencies could be shutdown for two weeks and no one would ever notice.
If Congress knew that federal employees would be layed off for weeks without pay, and Congress had to face their wrath, Congress would never dare to shutdown the government again over a petty political squabble.
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How about starting with Congress not getting paid during the shutdown? That would prevent the shutdown in the first place, but of course they insulate themselves from all of these problems that might affect them.
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Congress is exempt. The law requires that Congress must be paid. Their paychecks checks keep coming. Most of them are wealthy and don’t need their paychecks anyway.
Laying off the Congressional staff for at least two weeks would make them think twice.
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Yes and that is the problem.
There is NO guarantee that any of the furloughed federal workers will be paid while staying home. And they are definitely forbidden from working even if they wanted to. In the past shutdowns, they were given back-pay by act of Congress. But this isn’t guaranteed. So I think we owe federal workers a bit of empathy, since the shutdown is no fault of theirs.
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When those of us taxpayers in the private sector get laid off, and we definitely do Not get paid when we are not working. That is a reality we have to deal with. We sometimes get unemployment, but often nothing.
We need a new law that forbids paying federal workers while they are off work on furloughs. Federal employees need to share a little bit of the private sector work experience and develop some understanding and empathy for those of us in the private sector.
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Trust me when I say that federal workers experience all sorts of bureaucratic pain that the private sector know nothing about. And I think this furlough is a perfect example. How often does a private company lay off workers and lock the doors due to the intractability of a group of 535 + 1 Cheetos colored buffoon?
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Minus the cheeto, it was pretty regular during the previous 8 years…
Edit on second thought…It was because of the actions of a few of the 535 and a non-cheeto…
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I imagine REC’s personnel, including examiners will be furloughed as well?
Only in America!!!
If I recall 9th grade civics correctly, bills for raising revenue must originate from the House.
The House passed a spending bill, the senate rejected that spending bill.
Further, I think the “nuclear option” (51 instead of 60) works in the Senate for taxes and budgets.
None of this, however, is President Trump’s fault insofaras a bill has not reached his desk.
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Alan Dershowitz described the government shutdown situation and the best cure quite well.
He said that “allowing Congress to shut down the government by withholding appropriations is like ALLOWING CHILDREN TO PLAY WITH MATCHES.” It’s time take the matches away from Congress with a constitutional amendment that specifies that if Congress fails to adopt appropriations for the current fiscal year budget, the amounts in the previous years budget are automatically appropriated, subject to future amendment.
The RECs are part of NMC, so if civilians in NMC are furloughed, civilians in the REC will probably be also, with the possible exception of the chief of the REC.
Not really. The last shut down was 2013, and while continuing resolutions to keep open for short periods are now common, there was only one time since 2013 that a shut down was considered a realistic possibility (i.e. leaving on Friday with instructions that began “if we are shut down…”
Bad idea man.
If anything the 17th amendment should be repealed.
We were referring to private sector jobs that were regulated out of existence.
You make an important point. President Trump said that he’d sign whatever compromise CR that the house and senate passed and put on his desk. The House did its job, the Senate did not do its job. So this problem is on the Senate, not on Trump.
People are fond of saying that the Republicans Control the Senate with 50 votes, plus the VP to cast tie breaking votes, but obviously they don’t have control since Senate rules require 60 votes to cut off debate and hold a binding final vote. The Democrats have the ability to block this CR, and they are doing it.