Persasive Essay on Sequestor

Government Sequester Essay

Christopher A. Nichols

COMM/215

March 11, 2013

Brooke Mc Donough

Government Sequester Essay

On March 1st, 2013 President Obama signed into law about $1 trillion in automatic across the board budget cuts known as sequester. The Sequester will cut a vast amount of jobs across the nation, harm the elderly, young and military members. The automatic budget cuts will impact the Department of Defense federal employees, defense contractors and military readiness of the armed forces the most(Obama, 2013).

The across the board budget cuts will greatly impact the wellbeing of Department of Defense federal employees. Federal employees are being forced to take administrative furloughs which harms pay, medical and dental insurance as well as family life for the employees.

Administrative Furlough

Administrative furlough is planned in advanced allowing the agency time to anticipate reduced funding caused by the budget cuts. When employees are administratively furloughed they will be placed in a temporary nonduty and nonpay status. With talking to Mr. Detwiler a federal employee on Parris Island the furloughs are currently scheduled to last 22 weeks. The employees are scheduled to work four days a week and eight hours per day which will reduce their pay by 20 percent. The federal government is not laying off federal employees but causing those same employees to drastically make ends meet with 20 percent less pay per paid period(United States Office of Personnel Management, 2013).

Insurance

Insurance coverage will start to take a big hit on federal employees since they will have the same coverage but will make less pay to afford the premiums. The United States Office of Personnel Management has enacted plans to help employees cover their premiums for medical and dental insurance by accumulating and withholding from pay until the employer has sufficient funds to cover the cost. Even after the furlough is over the employer could still see a...