Author: Stephen Johnson / Source: Big Think
- A new map from WalletHub, generated by comparing various federal data, shows the states most affected by the government shutdown.
- About 800,000 federal employees are furloughed or are working without pay.
- Government shutdowns have become an increasingly common political tool, but it wasn’t until the early 1980s that they started resulting in the closing of federal agencies.
Friday marked the 21st day of the federal government shutdown, tying the record with the longest-running one in American history.
As a partisan battle over border security funding continues to grip the capital, about 25 percent of the federal government has been closed down, and some 800,000 federal workers are furloughed or working without pay. Some federal agencies had already received funding prior to the shutdown and have remained open, including Defense, Education, Veterans Affairs, Energy, Labor, Health and Human Services, Legislative branch and the Bureau of Reclamation.
Meanwhile, others have closed their doors, including Agriculture, Commerce, Justice, Homeland Security, Housing and Urban Development, Interior, State, Transportation and Treasury.
As the shutdown approaches three full weeks in length, some parts of the country are getting hit harder than others. A new map from WalletHub — generated by comparing metrics like share of federal jobs, federal contract dollars per capita, share of families receiving food stamps, real estate as a percentage of gross state product, and access to national parks — shows these discrepancies in full.
The data shows that:
- Red states are hit…
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