US Federal Shutdown Threatens to Worsen DC’s Economic Slowdown

The federal government shutdown threatens to exacerbate an economic slowdown in the DC metropolitan area, which is already reeling from months of Trump administration cuts.

As the shutdown nears the one-week mark, Republican and Democratic lawmakers remain in a stalemate over health care subsidies in a plan to fund the government. An estimated 750,000 federal workers have been temporarily placed on an unpaid leave of absence, and the Trump administration is considering not paying them back when the government reopens. The White House has also threatened to outright fire thousands of workers.

The temporary loss of paychecks and threats of new ...