ripple effects from government employment/contracting uncertainty in DMV economy?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I hope everyone in the DMV realizes that these government layoffs are going to cause people in the private sector and small businesses to lose jobs too. If you have ever lived in a factory town when the factory closes, all businesses go down too.

Good luck with your property values.

There will be pain but we will sacrifice for the greater good.

You won't survive this sacrifice, you are not special. Something has to change to what's going on, and at some point even the biggest fans of DOGE will start questioning when new jobs will be created and all the prosperity they are promised will start trickling down to them. So far proposed budget is going to add to national debt too.. let's find out where they are planning to spend and how this will benefit you.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This new EO will complete destroy the economy in the DC metro and the US at large. Requiring that agencies get rid of 4 employees for every 1 employee they hire. This rule basically mandates that government agencies reduce their staff by 8% each year. In combination with mass scale RIFs you are easily looking at a 30-50% decline in the federal workforce. In combination with the proposed budget cuts of 250 billion per year, you are looking at job losses in excess of 3 million people for the US. This does not even consider the spillover effects of employed people cutting back on spending due to lower consumer confidence. It will be an unmitigated economic disaster that is completely self inflicted.

This is a declaration of war on the middle class - coming after the tech layoffs over the past two years, flooding the market with experienced and credentialed white collar workers who were (in many agencies) underpaid will stagnate salaries for twenty years.

Most of y’all aren’t qualified for a real job. Hope you can learn a trade.

+1. Everyone complaining should try working a real job like being a plumber. There are plenty of job openings. Plus you just may enjoy it -- much more fulfilling and respectable than sitting at a desk typing "reports" and doing emails for a living.

You are high if you think plumbers don't have to compete with one another for customers and can just effortlessly make a living especially in declining local economy when their pool of customers will be reduced to those who are in emergency situations, vs. people upgrading, building new and having extra cash to spend. Every single sector of economy relying on customers, especially those with disposable income will suffer. This means your restaurants,stores, car dealerships, furniture stores, bakeries, spas, cosmetic surgery clinics, gyms, landscaping/hardscaping/cleaning businesses, tutors, travel sports teams, even dry cleaners. When people cut costs they cut all of the above as non-essential. This will happen in DC for sure, but also will happen all over the country.

As far as RE values go, because DC is transient and unless this is indeed our last administration, there are changes every 4-8 years, people leave, new come in. Many here have networth in millions and will weather the storm in their luxury mcMansions. Those in previously hot RE markets in red states are going to see their values plummet too, their sale maps don't look any better than DC and that's before all the waves from mass layoffs reach them, which they will.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I hope everyone in the DMV realizes that these government layoffs are going to cause people in the private sector and small businesses to lose jobs too. If you have ever lived in a factory town when the factory closes, all businesses go down too.

Good luck with your property values.

There will be pain but we will sacrifice for the greater good.

You won't survive this sacrifice, you are not special. Something has to change to what's going on, and at some point even the biggest fans of DOGE will start questioning when new jobs will be created and all the prosperity they are promised will start trickling down to them. So far proposed budget is going to add to national debt too.. let's find out where they are planning to spend and how this will benefit you.

I’ll be fine. Not at all worried. My kids and their kids will be fine. Already taken care of from real work.

As for the other aspects you mentioned, I wish you all had thought of that before you spent decades looting the treasury.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I heard a lot of defense contracts are getting canned.

Lockheed Martin has been eating high off the hog since 9/11. Having worked there, I witnessed gobsmacking waste. It has to be the same at the other contractors too. So, for them to go through some downsizing is a good thing.

The thing is, I'm all for Lockheed Martin shrinking. And, certainly, there's some dead weight among federal government workers as well. I just don't trust Elon Musk to be surgical and strategic.

Same.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I live in Silver Spring. Lots of feds who are uncertain about their future. Even if they don’t get fired / RIF’d, they question the point of working for an agency whose heads want to undermine the mission (eg, EPA or HHS).

One canary I’m seeing: houses in my neighborhood used to get scooped up in days. No longer. Houses sitting for weeks and many more of them than I can recall being for sale this time of year - literally five or six in the blocks near me …. There weren’t that many at one time during the spring, which is usually the high point for sales in my community. People who can are leaving the area. It’s sad and I worry it will absolutely gut communities like mine.

Been looking for similar signs in Upper NW DC but so far two homes were under contract in less than 2 weeks. One is a complete remodel that had to drop their asking price by a decent amount (which they did quickly)...but still seems to be under contract for more than I would expect.

The other is for $3MM and under contract within a week. That one surprises me because even in Upper NW DC you don't see many homes listed for $3MM.

There is literally only one home for sale right now in like a 3/4 mile radius of where we are.

That’s because you’re literally in DC and there is the RTO.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I go to the same weekly fitness class in my neighborhood (not by the downtown offices) and its been getting emptier for the last 3 weeks. I would not be surprised if they run a class pack promotion soon. I'm sure it is a combination of RTO and people pulling back on discretionary spending.

People are showing up for work.

I think you meant to say "People are commuting to the office". Which means that instead of being able to go to a fitness class in their neighborhood before getting online for the day, they are now spending that time sitting in the car or on the metro.

I’m not OP, but as a former fed- many (most if not all) of my colleagues did things like work out in the middle of the work day.

100%

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Whole DMV is screwed. It's not just feds. You understand this wipes out a ton of highly paid lobbyists, lawyers, NGO workers, contractors, etc. the list goes on. Guess what, that also means they spend a lot less now on restaurants, home renovations, replacing rooves, buying cars, etc. etc. The effects will ripple down and obliterate the DMV economy. Everyone complained about the cost of home repairs and upgrades. Well, that may no longer be a problem since contractors are about to get slammed due to lack of spending/work. Restaurants are going to be obliterated. Commerical RE will tank too. It is domsday.

I no longer live in DMV but I hope my parents’ church goes down. Attendance was already dwindling and my MAGA parents center everything there. They haven’t put together that most of their donors are likely connected to federal government.

[Anonymous]

Theres a lot of doom and gloom on here. Let me just remind you that the consensus on this forum has been perpetually wrong about everything, from Kamala is winning to the Ukraine war will be over soon and Russia is running out of tanks, to a million other examples. It's fun to make banter and all but I caution anyone about taking what the posters on here say seriously.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Whole DMV is screwed. It's not just feds. You understand this wipes out a ton of highly paid lobbyists, lawyers, NGO workers, contractors, etc. the list goes on. Guess what, that also means they spend a lot less now on restaurants, home renovations, replacing rooves, buying cars, etc. etc. The effects will ripple down and obliterate the DMV economy. Everyone complained about the cost of home repairs and upgrades. Well, that may no longer be a problem since contractors are about to get slammed due to lack of spending/work. Restaurants are going to be obliterated. Commerical RE will tank too. It is domsday.

I no longer live in DMV but I hope my parents’ church goes down. Attendance was already dwindling and my MAGA parents center everything there. They haven’t put together that most of their donors are likely connected to federal government.

That does make me feel better, in an angry bitter sort of way.

We're cutting back on all expenses, and even my therapist says they are losing patients because people are getting spooked about the cost right now.

[Anonymous]

The Clinton Administration reduced the workforce by 350K and everything was fine.

Very few of the posters here have any concept of history, the memory of a goldfish and have to make everything all about them.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The Clinton Administration reduced the workforce by 350K and everything was fine.

Very few of the posters here have any concept of history, the memory of a goldfish and have to make everything all about them.

Well, the Clinton administration did it in a legal fairly slow manner that didn't elicit panic.

I know, my family lived here at the time and worked for the federal government.

That is not what is being done right now.

We have stopped all expenditures except for groceries and bills. Private industry will have to support restaurant owners and small businesses.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This new EO will complete destroy the economy in the DC metro and the US at large. Requiring that agencies get rid of 4 employees for every 1 employee they hire. This rule basically mandates that government agencies reduce their staff by 8% each year. In combination with mass scale RIFs you are easily looking at a 30-50% decline in the federal workforce. In combination with the proposed budget cuts of 250 billion per year, you are looking at job losses in excess of 3 million people for the US. This does not even consider the spillover effects of employed people cutting back on spending due to lower consumer confidence. It will be an unmitigated economic disaster that is completely self inflicted.

This is a declaration of war on the middle class - coming after the tech layoffs over the past two years, flooding the market with experienced and credentialed white collar workers who were (in many agencies) underpaid will stagnate salaries for twenty years.

Most of y’all aren’t qualified for a real job. Hope you can learn a trade.

+1. Everyone complaining should try working a real job like being a plumber. There are plenty of job openings. Plus you just may enjoy it -- much more fulfilling and respectable than sitting at a desk typing "reports" and doing emails for a living.

My uncle had a “real job” as a bricklayer. His body was destroyed by the time he was 50 and he was taken care of because he had benefits arranged for by those report writers and email senders. Then when his wife got Alzheimer’s and had to go in a Medicare funded nursing home, it was his federal employee nephew, my dad, who navigated finding her a bed and paid for extra services, not her useless plumber son who couldn’t be bothered to figure it out because it interfered with their free time to drink and so drugs. So spare me your salt of the earth noble tradesman bs. I’ve got them in my family and most of them are life’s losers who would take the first handout that came their way, and the ones who aren’t run rings around them, make a ton of money, and send their kids to college.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I hope everyone in the DMV realizes that these government layoffs are going to cause people in the private sector and small businesses to lose jobs too. If you have ever lived in a factory town when the factory closes, all businesses go down too.

Good luck with your property values.

There will be pain but we will sacrifice for the greater good.

You won't survive this sacrifice, you are not special. Something has to change to what's going on, and at some point even the biggest fans of DOGE will start questioning when new jobs will be created and all the prosperity they are promised will start trickling down to them. So far proposed budget is going to add to national debt too.. let's find out where they are planning to spend and how this will benefit you.

I’ll be fine. Not at all worried. My kids and their kids will be fine. Already taken care of from real work.

As for the other aspects you mentioned, I wish you all had thought of that before you spent decades looting the treasury.

Who looted the Treasury. Seriously, what ARE you talking an out? All these Trumpers thinking their work in the private sector somehow is legitimate over government workers is laughable. Unless you are a doctor, you and your work really aren’t that special.

Government workers help you get a passport, process social security payments or make sure Exxon is punished for spilling oil all over Alaska. While you do what exactly? Are there unnecessary programs, sure? But the vast majority are good and government workers work hard. Your inability to understand this shows a lack of critical thinking. My husband and I have never worked for the government but appreciate their work. My husband works in banking and while he isn’t in favor of some of the regulations there, he recognizes the importance of the CPFB. He has had a front row seat to the predatory lending and its impact on the lower socioeconomic class. The class that Trumpers pretend to champion. But in reality don’t give an F about.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This new EO will complete destroy the economy in the DC metro and the US at large. Requiring that agencies get rid of 4 employees for every 1 employee they hire. This rule basically mandates that government agencies reduce their staff by 8% each year. In combination with mass scale RIFs you are easily looking at a 30-50% decline in the federal workforce. In combination with the proposed budget cuts of 250 billion per year, you are looking at job losses in excess of 3 million people for the US. This does not even consider the spillover effects of employed people cutting back on spending due to lower consumer confidence. It will be an unmitigated economic disaster that is completely self inflicted.

This is a declaration of war on the middle class - coming after the tech layoffs over the past two years, flooding the market with experienced and credentialed white collar workers who were (in many agencies) underpaid will stagnate salaries for twenty years.

Most of y’all aren’t qualified for a real job. Hope you can learn a trade.

+1. Everyone complaining should try working a real job like being a plumber. There are plenty of job openings. Plus you just may enjoy it -- much more fulfilling and respectable than sitting at a desk typing "reports" and doing emails for a living.

Lol you think Elon and Trump think a plumber is more respectable than a white collar worker?

When was the last time either sat and had a meal with a plumber?

BTW dh is in IT and deals with alot of our plumbing issues.

My husband has an advanced STEM degree and he installs and fixes all our appliances, handles all our plumbing stuff, and completely renovated our basement including doing tiling and drywall. Anything he doesn’t know how to do he just watches a video on YouTube. We haven’t had to pay for a tradesperson in years. I’m pretty sure he could do your job, but I’m pretty sure you couldn’t do his because you couldn’t do the math.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This new EO will complete destroy the economy in the DC metro and the US at large. Requiring that agencies get rid of 4 employees for every 1 employee they hire. This rule basically mandates that government agencies reduce their staff by 8% each year. In combination with mass scale RIFs you are easily looking at a 30-50% decline in the federal workforce. In combination with the proposed budget cuts of 250 billion per year, you are looking at job losses in excess of 3 million people for the US. This does not even consider the spillover effects of employed people cutting back on spending due to lower consumer confidence. It will be an unmitigated economic disaster that is completely self inflicted.

This is a declaration of war on the middle class - coming after the tech layoffs over the past two years, flooding the market with experienced and credentialed white collar workers who were (in many agencies) underpaid will stagnate salaries for twenty years.

Most of y’all aren’t qualified for a real job. Hope you can learn a trade.

+1. Everyone complaining should try working a real job like being a plumber. There are plenty of job openings. Plus you just may enjoy it -- much more fulfilling and respectable than sitting at a desk typing "reports" and doing emails for a living.

Lol you think Elon and Trump think a plumber is more respectable than a white collar worker?

When was the last time either sat and had a meal with a plumber?

BTW dh is in IT and deals with alot of our plumbing issues.

My husband has an advanced STEM degree and he installs and fixes all our appliances, handles all our plumbing stuff, and completely renovated our basement including doing tiling and drywall. Anything he doesn’t know how to do he just watches a video on YouTube. We haven’t had to pay for a tradesperson in years. I’m pretty sure he could do your job, but I’m pretty sure you couldn’t do his because you couldn’t do the math.

Smartest person I know was a former quant at a hedge fund, with an autistic level IQ. He quit because he had a bizarre obsession with HVAC systems and now works in the HVAC industry. Second smartest I know, who I grew up with, is head of a large department at Trane. Your husband, despite being your little super hero, is a literal midwit compared to both of them. I too have "an advanced STEM degree" (lol what kind of moron even uses that term) from a top engineering school and I can tell you that there are plenty of not that smart people who manage to hack it at the math required to graduate, so please spare us your acting like your husband is God's gift to both mathematics and the trades.