Government Shutdown - September, 2025 Editiion

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Why does the GOP hate government workers so much? They’re paid less than private industry and no raise this year but an increase in healthcare premiums. I don’t understand where the deep loathing comes from?

I live in northern Virginia near Herndon. my gov workers call it middle class welfare. one works at commerce. he is middle manager and does so little work. he says it is like 20% of private industry, mainly herding the cats of incompetent workers that have been hired to work there. the deep state is there because these people are incapable of working anywhere else .

my own personal experience working as a contractor at GSA was similar. 6 to 2:30 shifts. no one did anything before 9:00. then of course a couple meetings and lunch. then not too long to fight the long commute south. you could fire 50% and the office would be better off.

then there is the secret agencies. never worked there but had 2 friends. one from CIA and retired with huge pension and health care covered. he always had his weekends free during his work years,. never worked late, and now he is a multi millionaire after working for the government.

another one was LT colonel when retired , got huge pension with cola, and then worked as contractor , now he has huge sound side property and condo and lives like a king.

that is where the deep loathing comes from.

You have “deep loathing” for UMC government workers but don’t see why people are enraged by Trump and Musk enriching themselves and other billionaires on your tax dollars? That doesn’t trigger some cognitive dissonance…

[Anonymous]

Looks like the shutdown is going to happen and it's going to make Trump and his so-called "mandate" look like a complete joke.

Or, the Republicans could just stop being jackasses.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Why does the GOP hate government workers so much? They’re paid less than private industry and no raise this year but an increase in healthcare premiums. I don’t understand where the deep loathing comes from?

I live in northern Virginia near Herndon. my gov workers call it middle class welfare. one works at commerce. he is middle manager and does so little work. he says it is like 20% of private industry, mainly herding the cats of incompetent workers that have been hired to work there. the deep state is there because these people are incapable of working anywhere else .

my own personal experience working as a contractor at GSA was similar. 6 to 2:30 shifts. no one did anything before 9:00. then of course a couple meetings and lunch. then not too long to fight the long commute south. you could fire 50% and the office would be better off.

then there is the secret agencies. never worked there but had 2 friends. one from CIA and retired with huge pension and health care covered. he always had his weekends free during his work years,. never worked late, and now he is a multi millionaire after working for the government.

another one was LT colonel when retired , got huge pension with cola, and then worked as contractor , now he has huge sound side property and condo and lives like a king.

that is where the deep loathing comes from.

Your anecdotes are exaggerated. Nobody comes out of government with a huge pension -- it's based on salary, and those are below-market. (And people under the old plans got bigger pensions, but those people are pretty old now.) You are probably ignoring things like your friend being highly educated in a specialized area, worked for a single employer for decades, was a good saver and investor, was a prudent spender, etc.

Anyway, the claims you make about gvt workers are not what I see.

They also seem very off. All the CIA/State people I know worked weekends and late on weekdays. They've generally jad good retirements but that's because they barely spent when they were working because they were so busy.

I worked 25 years in the private sector and almost 20 as a fed and I worked my ass off in both. There's a lot more regulatory burden and paperwork in government than in private sector, which comes from layers of oversight and accountability and reporting which uninformed conservatives don't think exists, and which certainly doesn't exist in the private sector anywhere to the extent it does in government. Wages were definitely higher in private sector, benefits like healthcare slightly better in public sector. Federal retirement (FERS) isn't all that great, it's far more about what I socked away in the TSP and in my outside brokerage account, Roth and IRA than what the government does on that front.

Healthcare has significantly eroded and you get a better deal (lower premiums etc) in equivalent private sector jobs.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Shut. It. Down.

Amen!

The Federal Acquisition Regulations (FAR) is approximately 2,000 pages long, but when including agency supplements and specific rules, it can exceed 5,000 pages.

As of 2024, the Federal Register contained approximately 71,222 pages. This number can vary each year based on the volume of documents published.

The IRS tax code is approximately 6,871 pages long, and when including federal tax regulations and official guidance, the total can rise to about 75,000 pages.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Why does the GOP hate government workers so much? They’re paid less than private industry and no raise this year but an increase in healthcare premiums. I don’t understand where the deep loathing comes from?

I live in northern Virginia near Herndon. my gov workers call it middle class welfare. one works at commerce. he is middle manager and does so little work. he says it is like 20% of private industry, mainly herding the cats of incompetent workers that have been hired to work there. the deep state is there because these people are incapable of working anywhere else .

my own personal experience working as a contractor at GSA was similar. 6 to 2:30 shifts. no one did anything before 9:00. then of course a couple meetings and lunch. then not too long to fight the long commute south. you could fire 50% and the office would be better off.

then there is the secret agencies. never worked there but had 2 friends. one from CIA and retired with huge pension and health care covered. he always had his weekends free during his work years,. never worked late, and now he is a multi millionaire after working for the government.

another one was LT colonel when retired , got huge pension with cola, and then worked as contractor , now he has huge sound side property and condo and lives like a king.

that is where the deep loathing comes from.

…

So you are telling us the contractors like you are parasites. All the more reason not to privatize veterans’ benefits or social security that people paid into their entire working lives.

[Anonymous]

Dems are already caving haha. There is not going to be a shutdown.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Dems are already caving haha. There is not going to be a shutdown.

Oh yeah--where do you see that>

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Dems are already caving haha. There is not going to be a shutdown.

Yes!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Looks like the shutdown is going to happen and it's going to make Trump and his so-called "mandate" look like a complete joke.

Or, the Republicans could just stop being jackasses.

no shutdown.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Dems are already caving haha. There is not going to be a shutdown.

Citation needed

[Anonymous]

I think it would be wild if Trump actually went through with his threat to fire all non-excepted federal workers if there's a shutdown.

That would absolutely cement his fate as being the stupidest, most destructive and most incompetent President in US history.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Shut. It. Down.

Amen!

The Federal Acquisition Regulations (FAR) is approximately 2,000 pages long, but when including agency supplements and specific rules, it can exceed 5,000 pages.

As of 2024, the Federal Register contained approximately 71,222 pages. This number can vary each year based on the volume of documents published.

The IRS tax code is approximately 6,871 pages long, and when including federal tax regulations and official guidance, the total can rise to about 75,000 pages.

The FAR is extensive so as to prevent things like a president just awarding a contract or part of a company to a crony.
The tax code is complicated to give loopholes to millionaires and billionaires. Take out the loopholes and the tax code will be lot simpler.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Shut. It. Down.

Amen!

The Federal Acquisition Regulations (FAR) is approximately 2,000 pages long, but when including agency supplements and specific rules, it can exceed 5,000 pages.

As of 2024, the Federal Register contained approximately 71,222 pages. This number can vary each year based on the volume of documents published.

The IRS tax code is approximately 6,871 pages long, and when including federal tax regulations and official guidance, the total can rise to about 75,000 pages.

That doesn't happen in a vacuum. It happens every time Congress takes some action. Congress passes a law, then agencies need to figure out how to implement it, via rulemaking. There's years and years and layers and layers and I honestly doubt Congress or others at this point are even able to make sense of much of it to understand what's already in it.

It's still baffling why, rather than trying to oppress federal workers and force them out, and cripple agencies with yet more arbitrary rules and redundant oversight over expenditures greater than $100k, that DOGE didn't use AI to go through the FAR and other regulatory documents to find areas of redundancy, inconsistency, and so on to get it cleaned up and simplified?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Why does the GOP hate government workers so much? They’re paid less than private industry and no raise this year but an increase in healthcare premiums. I don’t understand where the deep loathing comes from?

I live in northern Virginia near Herndon. my gov workers call it middle class welfare. one works at commerce. he is middle manager and does so little work. he says it is like 20% of private industry, mainly herding the cats of incompetent workers that have been hired to work there. the deep state is there because these people are incapable of working anywhere else .

my own personal experience working as a contractor at GSA was similar. 6 to 2:30 shifts. no one did anything before 9:00. then of course a couple meetings and lunch. then not too long to fight the long commute south. you could fire 50% and the office would be better off.

then there is the secret agencies. never worked there but had 2 friends. one from CIA and retired with huge pension and health care covered. he always had his weekends free during his work years,. never worked late, and now he is a multi millionaire after working for the government.

another one was LT colonel when retired , got huge pension with cola, and then worked as contractor , now he has huge sound side property and condo and lives like a king.

that is where the deep loathing comes from.

A) It's not "welfare" if they are working and
B) Your anecdote is just that. I worked for and with multiple agencies over a 25+ year career. And this is complete BS. There was -maybe- one or two people who were doing very little at the end of their career. Maybe. Everyone else worked hard and faithfully. And had big production that was measurable and was measured. This is esp true since going fully remote (even before COVID). People put in a lot of unpaid OT b/c they were home and were grateful for that.

So you can go F yourself and your tired federal employee tropes.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Why does the GOP hate government workers so much? They’re paid less than private industry and no raise this year but an increase in healthcare premiums. I don’t understand where the deep loathing comes from?

I live in northern Virginia near Herndon. my gov workers call it middle class welfare. one works at commerce. he is middle manager and does so little work. he says it is like 20% of private industry, mainly herding the cats of incompetent workers that have been hired to work there. the deep state is there because these people are incapable of working anywhere else .

my own personal experience working as a contractor at GSA was similar. 6 to 2:30 shifts. no one did anything before 9:00. then of course a couple meetings and lunch. then not too long to fight the long commute south. you could fire 50% and the office would be better off.

then there is the secret agencies. never worked there but had 2 friends. one from CIA and retired with huge pension and health care covered. he always had his weekends free during his work years,. never worked late, and now he is a multi millionaire after working for the government.

another one was LT colonel when retired , got huge pension with cola, and then worked as contractor , now he has huge sound side property and condo and lives like a king.

that is where the deep loathing comes from.

A) It's not "welfare" if they are working and
B) Your anecdote is just that. I worked for and with multiple agencies over a 25+ year career. And this is complete BS. There was -maybe- one or two people who were doing very little at the end of their career. Maybe. Everyone else worked hard and faithfully. And had big production that was measurable and was measured. This is esp true since going fully remote (even before COVID). People put in a lot of unpaid OT b/c they were home and were grateful for that.

So you can go F yourself and your tired federal employee tropes.

Typical dumb MAGA who gets mad about everything but billionaire welfare and the growing wealth gap.