White House believes that the closure will be twice as expensive

It makes it very unlikely that the government will be able to issue the GDP report for the fourth quarter due to January 30. An official in economic analysis could not say when or if the GDP report can be issued. "There is no way for us to know until we come back and evaluate all the different data sources that go into the prediction of GDP," said the official.

The officer asked not to be named because employees are prohibited from doing government work on furlough. "It's a bit more complicated this time compared to similar events lately," said BEA official, "because some data-giving agencies are open while others are closed. When we are back, we will complete our evaluation and publish one revised press release for all our economic indicators. "

Coincidentally, the GDP report was to be issued the second day of the Federal Reserve's first meeting of the year, with the central bank struggling to figure out the scale of the downturn and how to tailor interest rate policy.

But in a statement, a Fed spokesman seemed to downplay the importance of the missing data so far in the central bank's decision-making process.

"While having the full complement of governmental data available will be beneficial. The Fund's assessment of financial matters takes into account a wide range of information from public and private sources, as well as readings on national and international developments, and staff continues to provide a detailed financial picture for decision makers, says the statement.