Spending Cuts 2013 Begin: What Jobs and Services Will Be Cut and How Long Will it Last?

As sequestration officially begins, after President Obama was unable to convince Republicans to authorize more tax increases on wealthy Americans, the implementation and effect of the spending cuts is still murky.

They were never meant to go into effect, so little thought had been given to how to actually implement them.

"The process of trimming government budgets is slow and cumbersome, involving lengthy notifications to unions about temporary furloughs, reductions in overtime pay and cuts in grant financing to state and local programs," writes the New York Times. "Less federal money will, over time, mean fewer government contracts with private companies. Reduced overtime for airport security checkpoint officers will make lines longer, eventually."

But job losses could begin much sooner.

"It's all guess work at this point, but the Congressional Budget Office (which is pretty good at this sort of thing) thinks about 750-thousand jobs could disappear over a period of months," says CNN. "Here's a point of reference: in January, the U.S. economy added about 157-thousand jobs, we we'll lose around four times that many albeit over a greater period of time."

"The military's aerial hotshots -- the Air Force Thunderbirds and the Navy Blue Angels -- are canceling air shows," says the Christian Science Monitor. "National park hours are likely to be trimmed. State Department cultural programs will be pinched. Grants to states for public schools, Head Start, housing and community development, and environmental cleanup will be cut."

Defense take the biggest cut. "The hardest-hit part of the government will be the Pentagon, which has to make $40bn of cuts between now and September - about 9% of its budget," writes The Guardian. "Defence chiefs have already said that the move will delay deployments - such as a recent move of an aircraft carrier to the Gulf - and hurt national security. But almost every government department, from aviation to the park service, will be hit, with cuts amounting to about 5% of their overall budgets. Only Medicaid and welfare benefits such as food stamps are exempted."

But Wall Street seems unfazed by the potential fallout. "Investors on Friday again shrugged off the onset of the cuts, sending the Dow Jones Industrial Average up 35.17 points to 14089.66, its third-highest close of all time. The blue-chip index rose 0.6% for the week, its second consecutive weekly advance," writes The Wall Street Journal.

There is still hope for a deal in the coming weeks, as constituents begin to complain more loudly to representatives in Congress. But the debt ceiling extension expires on Mar. 27, so it's likely partisan battle lines will again be drawn, and Americans will need to get used to living in lean times.