Furloughed federal employees and labor unions staged a sit-in on Capitol Hill on Jan. 23, as the shutdown enters month two. (Video: Luis Velarde , Rhonda Colvin/Photo: Salwan Georges/The Washington Post)
As furloughed federal workers endure their fifth week without pay in what is now the longest partial government shutdown in U.S. history, their missed paychecks are adding up: A new study estimated that workers affected by the shutdown will be owed $6 billion by the end of this week.
While circumstances vary — some workers are off the job while furloughed, while others are working without pay — it’s estimated that roughly 800,000 workers have had their pay interrupted by the shutdown. The study from Sentier Research, an Annapolis-based research firm, used data from an annual household survey by the U.S. Census Bureau to create a sample of 833,000 federal workers and found that the average furloughed worker has lost $5,600 in wages so far in the shutdown. Collectively, these workers are owed $4.7 billion. The number will jump to $6 billion at the end of the week, when many will miss their paychecks for the second time.
That figure is triple the back pay racked up in the last major government shutdown in 2013, which lasted 16 days. Wages lost by some 850,000 federal workers amounted to roughly $2 billion, according to a study from the U.S. Office of Management and Budget.