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   Why government shutdowns seem to only happen in the US   
   1 October 2025   
   Robin Levinson-King and   
   Anthony ZurcherNorth America correspondent   
      
      
   The US government has shut down for 11th time since 1980.   
      
   In other countries, governments keep functioning, even in the midst of wars   
   and constitutional crises. So why does this uniquely American phenomenon   
   keep happening?   
      
   For most of the world, a government shutdown is very bad news - the result   
   of revolution, invasion or disaster. But in the US, it has become a kind of   
   bargaining tool for political leaders - and a perennial phenomenon.   
      
   America's federal system of government allows different branches of   
   government to be controlled by different parties. It was a structure   
   devised by the nation's founders to encourage compromise and deliberation,   
   but lately it has had the opposite effect.   
      
      
   That's because in 1980, the attorney general under President Jimmy Carter   
   issued a narrow interpretation of the 1884 Anti-Deficiency Act. The 19th   
   Century spending law banned the government from entering into contracts   
   without congressional approval; for almost a century, if there was a gap in   
   budgets, the government had allowed necessary spending to continue. But   
   after 1980, the government took a much stricter view: no budget, no   
   spending.   
      
   That interpretation has set the US apart from other non-parliamentary   
   democracies, such as Brazil, where a strong executive branch has the   
   ability to keep the lights on during a budget impasse.   
      
   The first US shutdown occurred shortly after in 1981, when President Ronald   
   Reagan vetoed a funding bill, and lasted for a few days. Since then,   
   there's been at least ten others that led to government agencies shutting   
   their doors, lasting anywhere from half a day to more than a month.   
      
   The last one, from 21 December 2018 to 25 January 2019, was the longest on   
   record.   
   What happens in a US government shutdown?   
      
   While some essential services do continue to run, like social security   
   payments and the military, hundreds of thousands of federal workers are not   
   paid.   
      
   During President Donald Trump's first term, the White House estimated that   
   the 2018-2019 shutdown, which lasted 35 days, reduced GDP growth by 0.1   
   percentage points for every week the salary stoppage went on.   
      
   Elsewhere in the world, such shutdowns are practically impossible. The   
   parliamentary system used by most European democracies ensures that the   
   executive and legislature are controlled by the same party or coalition.   
   Conceivably, a parliament could refuse to pass a budget proposed by the   
   prime minister, but such an action would likely trigger a new election -   
   not a stoppage in services like national parks, tax refunds and food   
   assistance programmes.   
      
   That's exactly what happened in Canada in 2011, when opposition parties   
   rejected the budget proposed by then-Prime Minister Stephen Harper's   
   Conservative Party, which had a minority of seats in parliament. The House   
   of Commons then passed a motion of no-confidence, triggering an election.   
   Meanwhile, the government's services ticked away.   
      
   Even in Belgium, which did not have an elected government in power for 589   
   days between 2010 and 2011, the trains kept running.   
      
   More recently, Ireland managed to keep everything running from 2016-2020   
   under a minority government with a confidence-and-supply system, which is   
   when parties not in power agree to support spending bills and confidence   
   votes.   
      
   But this type of cooperation has become increasingly rare in the US, where   
   warring political parties seem all-too willing to use the day-to-day   
   functioning of the government as a bargaining chip to extract demands from   
   the other side.   
      
   In March 2025, when top Senate Democrat Chuck Schumer agreed to back the   
   Republican's funding plan, he got flack from many members of his own party.   
   At the time, he said a government shutdown would play into Trump's hands,   
   letting him slash even more spending.   
      
   But this time, Democrats seem prepared to hold firm, lest they allow   
   health-care cuts to go through under their watch.   
      
      
   https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c1kw2wpnzwko   
      
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    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)