Economy Government Shutdown Jobs

GOP Government Shutdown Cost 120,000 Jobs

According to Jason Furman, the head of the Council of Economic Advisers, the GOP Government Shutdown likely cost the economy 120,000 jobs across multiple sectors.

via Bloomberg

The partial government shutdown this month trimmed 0.25 percentage point from fourth-quarter economic growth and cost the U.S. 120,000 jobs in October, President Barack Obama’s chief economic adviser said.

An analysis of daily and weekly economic data through Oct. 12 showed weakness in such areas as retail sales, economic confidence and mortgage applications, some of which was directly related to the 16-day shutdown.

Unfortunately, as the Bloomberg report points out, this may be a conservative number. Other economists have projected that the shutdown would cut as much as 0.5 percent off fourth quarter GDP.

The White House figures “may prove to be a little bit conservative,” said Russell Price, senior economist at Ameriprise Financial Inc. (AMP) in Detroit. He forecast the shutdown would shave as much as 0.5 percentage point from fourth-quarter gross domestic product.

It may be some time before we fully grasp the cost of the GOP Government Shutdown, however we do know that the sacrifice of these people was more or less in vain.

Ultimately congressional Republicans weren’t able to extract any major concessions to reopen the federal government, meaning tens of thousands of people, possibly even 120,000, paid a high price for nothing.