As federal workers face the prospect of missed paychecks during the partial government shutdown, their financial reality is rippling into the broader economy.
The roughly 800,000 government employees who are either furloughed or working without pay will be forced to start slashing their consumer spending when paychecks don’t appear this week. Private-sector contractors and other workers tied to the government are already seeing damage from lost business.
And a hit to the nation’s financial standing is on the horizon with a warning from Fitch Ratings on Wednesday about downgrading the government’s credit rating if the shutdown persists.
Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin has agreed to present lawmakers with a confidential briefing on Thursday concerning a plan to ease sanctions on businesses linked to Oleg Deripaska, a prominent Russian oligarch with close ties to Russian President Vladimir Putin.
President Donald Trump faces a tall task in his Oval Office address on Tuesday night: convincing voters outside of his political base that there is an urgent crisis at the nation’s southern border, that a wall along the border is necessary to solve it, and it’s worth a government shutdown that has stretched for nearly three weeks.
