On Oct. 1, 2025, the United States entered its most recent federal government shutdown after Congress failed to pass 2026 funding legislation. Nearly three weeks later, the shutdown remains in effect, with only essential operations continuing. The last government shutdown occurred during the Trump administration in 2018 and lasted 35 days.
Government shutdowns have sweeping effects across the United States, as government employees deemed non-essential are furloughed and programs such as the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) and the Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants and Children (WIC) begin to run out of funds without additional allocations from Congress. Services such as air traffic control and the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) are considered essential, meaning their employees are required to work without pay. Historically, employee call-outs have increased exponentially as shutdowns persist, which may lead to disruptions during the Thanksgiving travel season.
Assistant Professor of American Studies Christopher Elias notes that a major change since the last shutdown is the deep cuts to government infrastructure made during the Trump administration.
“At this point, partially because of so many of the cuts that happened with DOGE and some of the other elements of the federal government throughout the first 9 months of the Trump administration, perhaps some of the impacts of the government shutdown are going to be blunted a little bit,” said Elias.
Groups such as the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) have worked to eliminate government programs and spending, leading to layoffs of around 350,000 civil service workers since Trump took office in January. Now, with the shutdown in effect, there are few employees left to furlough.
“Part of what’s different about this shutdown is it probably will have less of an impact on us than other things the administration has done since January, and so in a different moment we might have felt more struck by the possibility that there could be problems here and there,” said President Alison Byerly.
In the world of higher education, effects from the shutdown remain further removed. Byerly emphasized that federally funded student aid programs, such as FAFSA, will continue for the 2025-26 academic year regardless of the shutdown. Faculty cannot apply for new research grants, however, so much research funding has already been disrupted in the past 9 months that this pause does not feel as significant.
“If we were a large research university that had defense contracts or contracts involving other agencies that entitled us to funding that might be paused, that might be a different story, but we are not currently experiencing anything significant,” added Byerly.
As far as those most directly impacted thus far, Vice President of Carleton Democrats Max Kroloff ’28 points to community members with ties to the federal government and the Washington, D.C., area.
“Federal employees live all over the country and include many different professions, including members of the military and air traffic controllers” said Kroloff. For these families, the emotional and financial burdens of the shutdown are much more imminent and present in their daily lives.
“The Trump administration has upended decades of precedent by not guaranteeing back pay to furloughed federal employees,” added Kroloff. This practice has the potential to turn a family’s temporary income pause into a long-lasting and serious change in financial circumstances.
Outside of families with direct ties to the federal government, government shutdowns have a unique economic impact more broadly. During the 2018 shutdown, the Congressional Budget Office reported an $11 billion deficit, three billion of which was never recovered. Combined with current economic circumstances, such as rising prices and specific recession indicators, this loss has the potential to significantly impact Carleton, Northfield and the lives of numerous students.
Government shutdowns have become increasingly common and longer over the past 15 years. The first shutdown that lasted longer than a week occurred at the end of 1995 and into 1996 during the Clinton administration. Since then, there have been three government shutdowns ranging in length from three to 35 days. Elias points to increases in partisanship within Congress as a primary factor, alongside changes in who representatives see as their constituents.
“From a Republican standpoint, there has been an impulse to try to shrink the government – particularly what the GOP thinks of as the welfare state – so much that a government shutdown doesn’t seem to particularly be that big of a deal,” said Elias.
This shrinkage limits the willingness of Congress members to compromise on bills needed to fund programs and end the shutdown. While the government shutdown is still in its early stages, worse effects may still be to come.
“The longer a shutdown goes, the worse it is going to get, the more impacts you are going to feel as an institution, maybe as a student or a faculty member or a staff member at the institution,” said Elias.
