<figure class="wp-caption alignright" id="attachment_479627" style="width: 300px;"><figcaption class="wp-caption-text" id="caption-attachment-479627">Laura Albert
(Photo courtesy University of Wisconsin-Madison)</figcaption></figure>

On Sunday, November 9, the U.S. Senate voted 60-40 to advance a temporary appropriations bill that, if adopted, would end the U.S. government’s longest shutdown. Eight Democratic Senators, Cortez Masto, Durbin, Fetterman, King, Hassan, Kaine, Rosen and Shaheen broke ranks to vote with Republicans in support of the stopgap bill, while Republican Rand Paul voted to oppose. The bill does not address the Democrat’s primary demand, to extend Affordable Care Act tax credits set to expire at the end of this year. The bill must also be approved by the House and signed by the President before going into effect. In the meantime, though, the federal government shutdown continues. Federal air traffic controllers have been working without pay since the shutdown began 40 days ago, and Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy said the FAA has seen 15-20 air traffic controllers retiring a day. Due to the labor shortages, tens of thousands of commercial air flights have been cancelled. Laura Albert is a Professor of Industrial and Systems Engineering at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, and she joined Monday Buzz host Brian Standing to explain how and why air traffic has ground to a halt.

Photo of Dane County Regional Airport control tower by Corey Coyle, CC BY 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons)

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