GEOFF BENNETT: Well, it is day 15 of the federal government shutdown, one of the longest lapses in funding in U.S.

history, with no end in sight.

And the effects for federal workers are far-reaching.

Hundreds of thousands have been furloughed.

Many others are working without a paycheck.

And some may be out of work permanently after the Trump administration announced plans for mass layoffs, which have been blocked in courts for now.

AMNA NAWAZ: "News Hour" has spoken to dozens of federal employees in recent days.

Many won't risk speaking publicly.

But others who are protected by their positions with workers unions are sharing their concerns and frustrations about the shutdown and how long it's already lasted.

MIKE GALLETLY, U.S.

Department of Agriculture: My name is Mike Galletly.

I live in Tooele, Utah, and I work for the United States Department of Agriculture as an I.T.

technician.

YOLANDA JACOBS, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention: My name is Yolanda Jacobs.

I work with the CDC out of Atlanta.

IMELDA AVILA-THOMAS, U.S.

Department of Labor: My name is Imelda Avila-Thomas.

I do work for the Department of Labor Wage and Hour Division in San Antonio, Texas.

TREKA HENRY, U.S.

Department of Housing and Urban Development: My name is Treka Henry.

I work for the U.S.

Department of Housing and Urban Development, and I live in Lenexa, Kansas.

YOLANDA JACOBS: I was trying to think of all of these words to describe what the last few months have been, and I just came to a four-letter word, hell.

IMELDA AVILA-THOMAS: We're ready to work and take on that backlog, take on all that extra work that we have been handed, and then now we're put at a standstill.

TREKA HENRY: Being a federal worker right now is -- it's -- it's -- sorry.

I'm just -- we are just really tired.

We're really tired of going through this year after year when it comes down to the -- whether it be a continuing resolution or a shutdown.

It's just we are not political pawns.

We have got to stop treating us like political pawns.

I'm sorry, Lisa.

MIKE GALLETLY: Obviously, everybody that I know is concerned about a RIF.

I don't see how we can really cut more than we already have.

YOLANDA JACOBS: Instead of us being able to breathe past one incident, before we can catch our breath, there's another and there's another.

And here we are.

We're at the shutdown, and the majority of us have been furloughed.

I received my paycheck on Friday.

It was a partial paycheck.

Now I am in a position where I have to look at what's most important for me to pay now and what can wait.

TREKA HENRY: My husband is also not getting paid.

However, he is having to report to work because he's an air traffic controller.

IMELDA AVILA-THOMAS: It's serious every day.

I think, as each day goes by that I don't work, and even though my letter says guaranteed back pay, what's been thrown out there, I don't know.

I'm concerned.

YOLANDA JACOBS: I have already started cutting back and.

That's something I did before they actually decided whether there would actually be a shutdown, because something told me, go with your gut.

MIKE GALLETLY: We're like everybody else.

I have got a mortgage payment, just like most other Americans.

I have a car payment.

I have got a child who's finishing college.

IMELDA AVILA-THOMAS: Cutting tutoring for my daughter with dyslexia, it is necessary.

However, it is something that at this point we have to save.

YOLANDA JACOBS: I hate to even put on a pot of spaghetti too many days in a row, but you have to do what you have to do.

MIKE GALLETLY: I went ahead and I filed for unemployment.

And I'm sorry, but that's just humiliating.

This is me not being able to provide for my family adequately.

And I didn't do this.

IMELDA AVILA-THOMAS: We show up to do our jobs every day.

And just Congress needs to do theirs.

TREKA HENRY: I certainly don't want to say -- say who needs to back down on what, who needs to compromise, but they all need to get to the table.

MIKE GALLETLY: We don't deserve this.

My people didn't do this.

We just want to work.

AMNA NAWAZ: Those were just a few of the federal workers affected by this shutdown.

For a bigger look at how many workers are off the job, Lisa Desjardins has been piecing together the numbers, and she's back at the super screen to help us better understand.

Good to see you, Lisa.

LISA DESJARDINS: Hello.

AMNA NAWAZ: So walk us through this right now.

How much of the government is actually shuttered and who could miss a paycheck?

LISA DESJARDINS: All right, let's get specific here and let's start with the core of the federal work force.

This are civilian workers.

These are the folks who run most federal agencies.

Here, each figure is 100,000 federal workers.

So, altogether, you're seeing the 2.1 million civilian workers in our federal work force.

How many of them have been furloughed?

Going through the agency plans for this shutdown, it's about 700,000.

These folks are all staying home, not on the job.

But what that means is, of course, most of the civilian work force is still on the job.

And this is just one chunk of what's going on in the federal government, because we also have, of course, active-duty military.

That's more than one million troops.

None of these folks have had their paychecks appropriated by Congress.

That also is one pressure point that we need to pay attention to.

But one reason the public may not have been feeling this shutdown so much is because, look at this, all of these folks here are still on the job.

So one pressure point we're watching for is the pay of these millions of federal workers.

Let's look at some dates here.

Today is a key one.

This is the day that the active-duty troops were set to get their pay in their bank accounts.

Now, again, Congress hasn't appropriated this, but President Trump has directed the Department of Defense to make sure they get this pay.

So that's something that lawmakers are not worried about right now.

But let's watch next week, Amna.

That's when these millions of civilian workers are to get their paycheck.

And right now they will get nothing.

That will be their first full missed paycheck for millions of people.

AMNA NAWAZ: Lisa, I know you have been reporting on the mass firings as well.

What do we know about how large they are and where they hit?

LISA DESJARDINS: Key questions.

And let's start with some context, again, 2.1 million federal workers in the civilian work force.

So the Trump administration announced Friday 4,100 layoffs.

But wait a minute.

Over the weekend, they rescinded 800 of them, reversing it.

So this is the number as of now that the Trump administration says it laid off in the past few days.

This is also the figure, these 3,300 federal workers, that a federal judge today paused the firing of.

So we ultimately don't know the fate of this group.

This number may look small compared to the overall federal work force, but this is a targeted group.

President Trump has said he's targeting Democratic agencies.

We haven't exactly known what that meant until now.

Let's look at the five agencies that had the biggest layoffs here, Treasury, Health and Human Services, Education, Homeland Security and Energy.

What do they have in common?

They all have subagencies that are taking large layoffs in this RIF, or reduction force, from the president, IRS, the Centers for Disease Control, in Education, the Special Education and Civil Rights Divisions, big layoffs there.

At Homeland Security, a cybersecurity subagency that deals with information and misinformation on the Internet.

And, at the Energy Department, I just confirmed today, green energy programs are where the mass layoffs happened there.

Again, the theme here is targeting from the Trump administration.

These are where he and Republicans have policy and political disagreements, some of these divisions being nearly eliminated -- Amna.

AMNA NAWAZ: Of course, the government shutdown continues.

Lisa Desjardins, thank you so much.

LISA DESJARDINS: You're welcome.