Excerpt: "When the government shutdown began a week ago, many federal workers were more irked than anxious. They're really anxious now."
A security checkpoint at Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport. Some federal employees, including Transportation Security Administration agents, continue to work despite the government shutdown. (photo: Al Drago/NYT)
30 December 18
hen the government shutdown began a week ago, many federal workers were more irked than anxious.
They’re really anxious now. What at first seemed like ho-hum political brinkmanship is looking more like a prolonged, punishing shutdown, more akin to the 27-day funding lapse in 1995 and 1996 than the blink-and-miss-it shutdowns earlier this year.
“This one feels different,” said Celia Hahn, a Transportation Security Administration officer at Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport, who is working without pay and worried about her mortgage and her son’s orthodontic expenses. “If it were to go about two weeks, that’s when people would start panicking.”