Can anyone recall if they closed down once before? I seem to remember something in the 70's. The US Debt level had apparently been frozen for quite a few weeks as the powers did accounting tricks and pillaged every reserve possible. This could really happen this time. I also read somewhere that after Obama and Merkel were re-elected they'd move forward with their plans. Clive Maund's Out of the Box had a very good article on the positioning of the CHY as a reserve currency and the rapid establishment of Shanghai as a finance centre, along with the already strong Hong Kong centre, and it's positioning to take over the role of the USD. Collapse or at least reconfiguring, of the western economies (which closure of the US government would hasten) seems assured and the rise of the East the inevitable result, however Maund also argues that the USA is such a powerhouse economy that a changeover could be a long way off. In answer to which I would say that it's all a little too fragile and has been since 2008. Derivatives is the fox in the hen house. Keep stacking folks.
Wikipedia states the US Government has shut down 17 times since 1976! Seems like it's a regular occurrence, although some of them were only partial shutdowns and/or limited duration (1-3 days): http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Government_shutdown#List_of_government_shutdowns The most recent was in 1995-1996, with two shutdowns totalling 28 days: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_federal_government_shutdown_of_1995_and_1996
Nothing new... the US Government was shutdown back in 1996 for about 2 weeks... can't remember the shutdown date... but the restart date was Monday, January 8, 1996... I know, I was there. Edit - Was personally involved in this shut-down, just could not remember the exact dates, except the Monday morning when the USA reopened for business.
A lot less government for a few days or weeks sounds like a libertarian's holiday even if it is mostly bureaucrats that are affected.
As Mark Thornton said recently, a government shutdown won't actually "shut down" the US Government. Vast swathes of the government will still continue to operate as per normal - military, post office, tax collection, treasury, law enforcement, social security, veterans welfare, hospitals, prisons, the court system etc will still be operating. It's only a few non-essential aspects that'll shut down. So it's not actually "shutting down".
Biggest outrage during the Clinton Govt shutdown was from holidaymakers when the National Parks shutdown. how do you shut down a forest? p.s. The unanimous vote against an Armed Forces pay freeze just shows that; 1) they intend to shut down Govt. again & 2) despite the fact that their armed forces are the major cause of their debt burden, they haven't the stomach to take on 'The Generals'. They're (and we're) doomed!
I know I'll start an argument here but the largest cause of the debt burden is welfare and 'entitlement' spending. Shutting down the government - including military salaries and maintenance - does not solve the problem of too much money being spent on welfare. Everyone seems to love bashing the military but it's not the biggest problem. (Please limit cries of 'warmonger' and quoting the phrase 'military industrial complex' to once per reply)
It just came from one of Kyle Bass' seminars where he showed the US's expenditure in terms of "3 buckets" of money. 1) Non-Discretionary (Pensions, Roads, Health Schools etc) 2) Non-Defence Discretionary (Pork Barrelling) 3) Defence It now takes all of the nation's tax-revenue to fill just the first bucket... the other two are funded by borrowing.
Well according to this graph the problem is not welfare OR defence, it is actually "everything else" http://www.google.com.au/imgres?img...a=X&ei=ygNJUq-DMYWAiQfv9ICADA&ved=0CFYQ9QEwBQ If they just got rid of "everything else" in the budget the deficit would be quite manageable.
I think he means shut down and at the same time stop stealing our taxes for their frivolous spending.
When I talk about MSM I mean the television and the 6 o'clock news.....Not everyone has time to surf the net all day searching for the latest news......MOST people are at work struggling to make a living.
