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117 sats \ 9 replies \ @siggy47 21h \ parent \ on: Bipartisan Blowback After White House Threat to Furloughed Workers’ Back Pay Politics_And_Law
I'm not so sure it's clear cut from a PR standpoint. You are "inside the beltway", like many of my friends. Often the mood of the country isn't easily read from there.
The idea of the rank and file drones of the bloated bureaucracy finally suffering a real layoff like the rest of us is powerful optics.
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I think siggy has a point here. I often hear things like, "Trump's actions have a real impact on people's livelihoods!" as a justification to anger. But they are just going through a common experience that most other people have to go through. Why do they feel like government work means you're entitled to absolute job stability? The Federal government supposedly exists to serve the people. It is not a jobs program for federal workers.
I understand why federal workers might be upset and they have every right to be. But if agency heads view their primary mission as protecting their subordinates' jobs, then the agencies will quickly devolve into bloated inefficient messes. (Which I think has already happened.)
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They need to identify as transgender contractors
Problem solved
Edit:
If back pay is approved, make it a paper check so people have to come into the office
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Bleach and HCQ
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All they're saying is that the backpay is not guaranteed automatically.
I'd say there's no chance of backpay actually being withheld because almost everyone in congress has a bunch of stuff they want the bureaucrats to do for them, which is why they always granted backpay before that law passed.
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The draft OMB memo reportedly argues that the 2019 law is not "self-executing" and that the payment would need to be specifically provided by Congress as part of the legislation to fund the government. The argument hinges on a technical reading, suggesting the law created an authorization to pay but not the actual appropriation.
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I saw somewhere that OMB hasn't even changed their FAQ, though, and it still says that all furloughed employees will receive backpay.
I think this was just a very feeble bluff.