BOTH REPUBLICANS AND DEMOCRATS are predicting the federal government will undergo a “train wreck” this fall — a temporary widespread shutdown due to a lack of funding. Once President Clinton and the Republican Congress come to terms on the budget, the “wreck” will be over, and the bureaucrats will return to work. But what about the “wreck” itself?. What will happen when Federal employees (like myself) stay away from their jobs because they’re not being paid?
Labor union and Clinton administration officials decry the oncoming “wreck” because, they say, “it will ruin people’s lives.” Perhaps this is a desperate attempt to deflect attention from the obvious benefit of the “wreck”: a federal bureaucracy on Slim Fast, reduced to only “essential personnel.”
The reality is that many federal employees plan to make the most of their tim e off, paycheck or no paycheck. We’ve had a couple of months to get ready finan cially. And if the “wreck” lasts only a day or two (highly probable) there’s a good chance we’ll get paid anyway, via “administrative leave.” Even if the “wre ck” proves a long one, we could collect unemployment insurance. My peers and fr iends, theref ore, aren’t worried or angry, but are calmly making plans to take advantage of their free time.
What will we bureaucrats be doing during the “train wreck”? Some will do what you might expect:
finish odd jobs around the house and spend more time with their kids. One friend of mine is going to Disney World, another is going to Florida to play golf with her sister, while another plans to cruise the Potomac with his wife ( who’s also a federal employee) on their powerboat.
Others will head out to their vacation homes or go on Christmas shopping trips, while the more industrious types will get caught up on their night- school homework or spend more time at their second jobs. Still others plan to ” ruin their lives” by getting married during the “wreck,” or by going hunting ( October is squirrel-hunting season in nearby Pennsylvania).
For most of us bureaucrats, it’s no big deal. We’ve learned how to play the game from the mini-wreck of 1986 (we had four hours off, but received administrative leave pay later) and the near-wreck in 1990. We know how to plan for shutdowns. As a friend advised, “Stay away from the fur shops and the racetrack and everything will be just fine.”
Joanne Sadler is a federal employee and a law student at George Mason University.
