A family selects items at the Armed Services YMCA food pantry in Harker Heights, Texas, on Oct. 30, 2025. (Rose L. Thayer/Stars and Stripes)
As the shutdown enters its second month, some furloughed federal workers are finding new sources of income after weeks of making do without paychecks.
They’ve taken on gig work and retail jobs; served as substitute teachers and notaries; or started their own businesses. Some are doubling down on existing skills, while others are pursuing new passion projects. In interviews, many workers said their side hustles are as much about keeping the bills paid as having something to do while waiting for the government to open back up.
Here are five federal workers who were willing to share their side hustles.
When the government is open, Isaac Stein works as a lawyer for the Internal Revenue Service, writing rules for 401(k)s and other retirement plans.
But these days, Stein, 31, is selling hot dogs, Moon Pies and RC Cola from his newfangled cart, called Shysters, on First and M streets NE in Washington.
Stein still wears a suit and tie every day — a nod to his legal career — and has spent thousands of dollars on the endeavor, which was meant to be a weekend hustle. But the shutdown has offered an opportunity to sling hot dogs seven days a week. He sells about 60 hot dogs a day, at roughly $10 a pop (with a drink). It’s “the only honest rip-off in D.C.,” his sign says.
“I love my day job, when I get to do it,” said Stein, who has been moonlighting for three weeks. “But I really enjoy this, too. I feel connected to the community.”
Stein started the process of setting up his business in June, reading through vending regulations, buying a $12,000 cart from Canada, obtaining sidewalk permits and submitting blueprints to the city’s health department.
To secure a motor vehicle license, he woke at 5 a.m. one morning and pushed the cart three miles to an emissions inspection station. Everything was ready around the time the government closed on Oct. 1. But he hasn’t turned a profit yet.
“I got furloughed from my day job,” he wrote in an early Instagram post. “My dream is slinging dogs in tailored clothing.”
It’s been a roller coaster of a year for Kysa Steele, 47.
Steele, who lives in San Antonio, began working in information technology for the federal government late last year. In February, she lost her job as part of a mass termination of probationary employees. She was reinstated in March but sidelined again by the government shutdown.
“This is my first shutdown and it’s kind of terrifying,” she said. “How long is this going to last? Will I get back pay? How do I pay my bills?”
Job hunting, she says, felt futile because there are so few openings. Instead she’s filling her time by writing cat fantasy fiction e-books about demon princess cats, feline detectives and an especially mischievous cat who turns into a human.
She’s sold a couple dozen copies so far, earning her less than $100. Kysa Steele is her pen name; she spoke on the condition of anonymity because she fears losing her job.
“I’m hoping that eventually they find their audience and maybe someday I can do this full time,” Steele said. “But even if it doesn’t take off anytime soon, I needed something fun to do, to keep myself sane.”
Next up, a novella about a chronically lying cat who’s stuck in space.
Back in February, when the U.S. DOGE Service cut large swaths of her agency, one D.C.-based researcher at the Department of Health and Human Services started encouraging her colleagues to line up side hustles. The researcher took her own advice, and started a marketing agency.
The researcher, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because she fears losing her job, took training courses in the evening and on weekends while building her business.
“I knew the storm was going to keep coming,” she said, adding that she’s in a particularly tight spot as a single parent. “As soon as the furlough started, I went 40 hours a week on my agency.”
She’s been making a lot of cold calls and has landed some business building websites, though mostly for friends and family. Once the government reopens, she plans to hire subcontractors to keep her business going. In the meantime, the longtime federal worker has deferred her mortgage payment for three months and put everything else on hold.
“I don’t have a lot of savings, and my kid has been draining me with college,” she said. “Hair appointments, eating out, going to the dentist - none of that is happening right now. I’m trying to hold on to as much cash as I can.”
The shutdown has been particularly tough for households with two federal workers.
That’s the case for one aviation worker on the East Coast, who’s been working without pay since Oct. 1. His wife, also a government employee, has been furloughed.
The worker, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because he fears losing his job, is a veteran who receives retirement payments from the military. But he says it isn’t enough to live on, especially because he’s still buying gas for his one-hour commute each day.
“We don’t live paycheck to paycheck, but Nov. 15, we’re going to run out of checking account money,” he said. “Our last full paycheck was more than four weeks ago.”
The employee is well-versed in gig work, he said. He drove for Uber and Lyft, and made deliveries for Door Dash while serving in the military. Last week, he reactivated those accounts and signed up for Instacart. Now, after 40-hour weeks, he spends about 10 hours making deliveries on the weekends. On a recent weekend, he made $113.
His wife, he said, is considering picking groceries for Kroger for $15 an hour.
“If I make $100, maybe I can pay for some groceries,” he said, adding that it costs about $200 a week to feed his family of three. “It’s definitely a burden, what we’re dealing with.”
Within the Agriculture Department, one staffer came into the shutdown prepared: She had started hunting for a side gig this spring. At the time, Elon Musk’s U.S. DOGE Service was taking a sledgehammer to the government, so she figured it would be smart to rustle up another source of income. The staffer, who spoke on the condition of anonymity for fear of retribution, began pursuing a soil classification license from her state, which is in the South. Half a year later, fully licensed and furloughed, she has started a company classifying soils for septic systems.
It means she is spending much of the shutdown in deep earthen pits, analyzing dirt smears for color, texture and structure.
“That gives me a sense of how this soil will behave,” she said. She then gives each batch of soil a “loading rate,” referencing how well it will absorb “effluent.”
The staffer has completed six assessments so far, she said. She is fielding oodles of calls, charging between $1,600 and $1,800 per classification and having a pretty good time.
Most people’s eyes glaze over, she says, when she starts talking about her shutdown job, but she almost prefers it that way.
“Soil scientists always work in the background,” she said.
Hannah Natanson contributed to this report.
