Nonessential Federal Practitioner Furlough Plans

[lord999]

For those of us who are going to be furloughed next month with the budget past the point of no return, do you have any good ideas (besides filing for unemployment) on where to spend December? I'd figure that I'd get some sunshine in, and is FL or TX Gulf Coast a nice place to visit during December?

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[gwarm01]

South Florida is sunny and warm year round. I know a great ramen place in Miami if you make it that far south. I'm hoping to spend some time in Palm Beach in January myself. Dinner on me if you're still on a government mandated vacation by then.

 

[BMBiology]

Why are you guys being furloughed?


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[lord999]

For my place, we've drastically overspent the budget to the point that even if Congress gets the budget passed, it's still too late for us to settle accounts in time without financial consequences. So, in order to save $, they are basically going to furlough some of us and then pay our salaries for not working after the accounts are settled after Treasury hits. This happened due to Cruz Control two years ago, and outside the essential personnel, the people who were furloughed basically gave up two paychecks for a 0% interest rate loan to be paid the month after, in exchange for not having to work for those two paychecks. Again, you get paid not to work for as long as a furlough is in effect, but you can't collect on the paycheck until the furlough is done. It's apparently (according to my Office of the Budget counterparts) literally cheaper to do that than to pay the associated penalties for late payment of other obligations.

It's a fantastic deal for people who did enough financial planning such that they can go without a salary for some time (although you get the money back later). But surprisingly, there's quite a number of people who can't afford even that long, so we find dumb things for them to do. On the downside, if we take a page from the Belgians, furloughs could be very long, so those who volunteered would have been screwed as it extended too long. I can be furloughed indefinitely as I have enough personal passive income (and honestly other work) that I could do in the interim. In 2013, I ended up taking a fall vacation with the wife and was very pleased at how nice it was for Ted Cruz to give us that gift for ObamaCare.

For essential personnel (active practitioners), it's exempted out so they still have to work. But for the Anti-Deficiency Act, paper pushers like me basically take a holiday at the taxpayers' expense due to Congressional infighting. What's going to suck is that anyone other than VA and DoD is probably going to have to suffer the 10 day furlough annually again if the budget stays substantially the way it is.

 

[jblil]

But for the Anti-Deficiency Act, paper pushers like me basically take a holiday at the taxpayers' expense due to Congressional infighting.

What is the common thread in the 4 items below?
- The check is in the mail
- Of course you're my first
- Relax, this is not going to hurt
- I am from the guvmint and I'm here to help

Not to hijack the thread, but I'd love to see term limits on members of Congress.

 

[bacillus1]

Ugh, so I guess we are about to lose our IT department again. Too bad, I was about to get a new computer.

 

[297point1]

Can I sign up for this program? I don't work for the federal government, but would like to take part in this deal...it sounds quite fantastic!

 

[beautifulrobot]

No furlough for me, or even for many of my civilian counterparts... Gotta love that PDUFA/GDUFA/BsUFA money.

 

[lord999]

Ugh, so I guess we are about to lose our IT department again. Too bad, I was about to get a new computer.

You'll actually get your stuff unless SDE FO diverts it somewhere else (realistically though, VISN 5 is going to follow VISN 20 in Cerner's deployment scheme, so FO will have to modernize equipment even if they have to steal from the rest of the district to make it happen). That's actually one of the obligations we slammed through before ADA capped us on $. It's between the Community Care budget and Cerner that bankrupted us, we're already on the hook for something like $200M (and I actually had the budget analyst write this down because I didn't believe the number correctly) in overextended obligations from underestimating the August $2.5 B budget override that Congress passed in August to supposedly last us until January. I got my Christmas wish list for hardware and storage done through our TAC in advance of the fiscal year turn because I thought this would happen, I just didn't realize we screwed up so badly. I'll be crying on the beach, probably.

 

[Saiyo]

South Florida is sunny and warm year round.

I'd go here. The gulf beaches have brown water and are cold in the winter. If San Diego is nice around this time id think about that too

 

[bacillus1]

You'll actually get your stuff unless SDE FO diverts it somewhere else (realistically though, VISN 5 is going to follow VISN 20 in Cerner's deployment scheme, so FO will have to modernize equipment even if they have to steal from the rest of the district to make it happen). That's actually one of the obligations we slammed through before ADA capped us on $. It's between the Community Care budget and Cerner that bankrupted us, we're already on the hook for something like $200M (and I actually had the budget analyst write this down because I didn't believe the number correctly) in overextended obligations from underestimating the August $2.5 B budget override that Congress passed in August to supposedly last us until January. I got my Christmas wish list for hardware and storage done through our TAC in advance of the fiscal year turn because I thought this would happen, I just didn't realize we screwed up so badly. I'll be crying on the beach, probably.

Yeah but I won't get it if there's no one to install it. I remember during the last shutdown all the IT people were furloughed.

 

[gwarm01]

Are shenanigans like this the reason why the Cerner install is going to take 10+ years?

 

[lord999]

No. It's going to take 10 years as when you buy an IT system, you're buying a workflow. Imagine not only having to train someone on the new system, but training them on a new workflow, and having to refer back to the old system for historical records. Also, it'll take even longer (and I doubt it's actually going to succeed) to reprogram those modules where NO ONE remembers how the logic works. Enrollment being the one I use for the most complicated rules due to Congress messing around with Title 38 since 1946.