President Trump has announced that RIF (Reduction in Force = mass firing) notices are going out to federal employees who are not working during the government shutdown. People/citizens who have no choice – have been ordered to not come to work – people who love and are committed to their public service jobs. People with families, mortgages, and other bills. People with absolutely no pay for going on three weeks. And, they are required to check their email daily! Many, if not most, cannot qualify for unemployment due to the wording of a “furlough.” Even if only one person loses a job in this process, it is too many!
I worked for the federal government for 40+ years with the National Park Service. For the last 20 years as a park manager, I routinely worked 60+ hours per week with no overtime or other compensation. With cost of living and other inflation factors, and government salary increases not keeping up – not even by half, I often lived paycheck to paycheck. I, along with many thousand other government workers, did this out of love for the job and love of for the ability to perform a public service.
But today, 4,000 public servants are experiencing the most awful stress imaginable. Multiply that stress by at least three times for the impact on their families! Then multiply THAT by any number you want, to come up with emotional, economic, and community impact that will be suffered! The temporary injunction may or may not be upheld.
Two Civil Service Acts (1883; 1978) and a 2019 Law were enacted to eliminate the former ‘spoils system’ of government employment, where people, most often friends and political supporters, were appointed regardless of qualification. Our government employees are not supposed to be beholden to the whims of elected and appointed officials for their job. However, the Acts rely on other branches of government to provide oversight, ensuring that the purposes of the Acts prevail. Today, those protections are not happening with any reliable degree of consistency, for multiple reasons. This Administration makes its own rules – adding immeasurably to employee stress! As a manager, these Acts and safeguards were critical to building and maintaining highly functioning teams. We were able to keep up with changing and advancing public needs, budgets notwithstanding. Service to the public kept up with needs. Bottom line: the public always benefited in some way.
Today, most of the federal workforce is in the lower middle class and most are just three months away from being broke and homeless. So, anyone subject to this mass firing notice has to contend with becoming destitute, immediately! So stressful! Even if the advocacy groups, unions, and courts are successful in blocking this action, all employees will have already suffered through soul crushing stress. The devastation we saw with the ‘Valentines Day Massacre’ (government employees’ reference to the first “downsizing” – mass elimination of employees) will be nothing compared to this. All of this downsizing will have very little effect on the federal budget because the civilian workforce makes up a very small percentage of the federal budget. But we are losing irreplaceable and valuable expertise and leadership in the civilian workforce.
Long-term effects are equally devastating. It will take at least 12 years (a little over two law-abiding Presidential terms plus completion of this Administration’s term) of aggressive civil service stability and promotion to restore faith in the Civil Service System and get well-qualified candidates to start applying for these critical jobs. 12+ years for the government to be able again to attract the best qualified candidates, restore some faith in government, and again advance this country’s operations: health care professionals, air traffic controllers, insurance professionals, lawyers, all manner of administrative personnel that ensure proper hiring practices and accounting of public funds, and professional federal law enforcement personnel (except ICE?).
Ken Mabery is a retired National Park Service park manager with more than 40 years of public service experience.
