Government Shutdown Could Bring Economic Disaster to Northern Virginia

I hope Ken Cuccinelli is enjoying the antics of his lunatic GOP brethren in the House of Representatives who are pushing the same agenda of failed GOP policies as Cuccinelli.  I suspect that Northern Virginia residents are in a far less happy mood as Neanderthal Republicans are poised to deliver an economic disaster to Northern Virginia and the larger Washington, D.C., area.  One can only hope that Northern Virginia voters will be mindful of which political party is responsible and vote a straight Democrat ticket on November 5, 2013.  The Washington Post looks at the economic harm coming thanks to the Tea Party/Christofascist Republicans.  Here are excerpts:

The Washington region, home to the largest concentration of federal workers and contractors in the nation, could lose an estimated $200 million a day and could see more than 700,000 jobs take a financial hit if the federal government shuts down Monday night, according to a local economist’s projections.

And that’s not counting the blow to tourism, one of the region’s economic mainstays, if the Smithsonian museums, the National Zoo, Civil War battlefields and other federally funded attractions are shuttered, said Stephen Fuller, director of George Mason University’s Center for Regional Analysis.

“This is serious,” Fuller said. “The national economy may not notice a shutdown much unless it lasts three or four weeks. But for the Washington area, this is a tsunami.”

In addition to the economic impact, area residents could also see cuts in federal services: no new applications for benefits such as Medicare, Social Security and child-care subsidies, no new housing or small-business loans, no new clinical trials for research funded by the National Institutes of Health and a murky prognosis for the safety net for those most in need.

The possible shutdown comes at a time when the region’s economy is weak, said Fuller, the economist. The across-the-board sequestration cuts earlier this year cost the region 26,500 net jobs in August, Fuller said. With furloughs and agencies not filling positions, the $42 billion annual federal payroll is down $2 billion from last year, and federal contracting is down $5 billion.  “We’re really bleeding,” Fuller said. “A shutdown will have real costs.”

To stave off such effects, local governments have been setting aside pots of money in anticipation of a shutdown. Montgomery County accounted for a possible $60 million loss in revenue in its current budget. Arlington County set aside $3 million, and Fairfax County has $8 million. Maryland and Virginia officials say they are looking at the possibility of tapping reserve funds.

Sadly, today's Republicans care nothing about average American families.  Their sole allegiance is to the very wealthy and spittle flecked, ignorance embracing Christofascists and Tea Part nutcases.