Furloughs, Spending Cuts | featured news

President Barack Obama has signed into law a bill to end furloughs of air traffic controllers. The furloughs stemmed from the automatic, across-the-board spending cuts that started taking effect in March. Millions of air travelers were affected recently by delayed flights across the country because of the furloughs.

With many air traffic controllers on unpaid leave, lawmakers criticized the agency for how it was handling the automatic budget cuts required by sequestration.

It was a tough start to the week for many air travelers as federal budget cuts led to cascading delays along the East Coast Monday morning. Some flights out of New York and Washington were delayed by more than two hours as the Federal Aviation Administration kept planes on the ground. The federal agency has said furloughs of air traffic controllers could lead to delays if there weren't enough people to monitor busy air corridors.

Defense Secretary Leon Panetta is telling Congress that if automatic budget cuts kick in on March 1 he may be compelled to furlough the "vast majority" of the Defense Department's 800,000 civilian workers....