Musk establishes a new government department, hiring employees with "extremely high IQs, working 80 hours a week."

Written by: Fan Fan

Edited by: Odette

Source: Guoke

In August this year, Musk and Trump connected on the X platform for two hours, discussing everything from international affairs to U.S. domestic politics. At the end of the conversation, Musk summarized, "Inflation comes from government overspending; we need a Government Efficiency Committee to control spending." Trump responded, "You're the best at layoffs; if you're willing to do this, I'm happy to have you."

After the conversation, Musk tweeted on X that he looked forward to serving America, "No pay, no title, no recognition."

At the time, many found it a bit absurd, as these two have always been like two ships passing in the night, each speaking their own language. Unexpectedly, the first major news after Trump's victory was the fulfillment of his promise to Musk, establishing the "Department of Government Efficiency," abbreviated as DOGE.

Musk even designed a logo for his new department, fewer words, bigger matters. | x.com

DOGE clearly borrowed its name from the Dogecoin that Musk has endorsed, but Trump quickly issued an official announcement, proving that this playful name was serious.

Remember the chaos caused by the surge and sell-off of Dogecoin? It's quite ironic to name a government department this way.

"The great Elon Musk," the announcement read, "will work alongside Vivek Ramaswamy (Indian-American businessman, entrepreneur, Republican) to jointly lead the newly established Department of Government Efficiency, abbreviated as DOGE."

In this announcement, Trump also claimed that the effort to cut government spending is as significant as the Manhattan Project, stating that the Department of Government Efficiency will collaborate with the White House Office of Management and Budget to promote large-scale government structural reforms, aiming to complete the reforms by July 4, 2026. "This is a gift for the 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence," Trump said.

Announcement from the Trump Vance government

Upon the news, Dogecoin's price surged, showing that the concept of stock speculation is the same in any country.

Currently, the DOGE department is widely recruiting talent online, requiring "super high IQ, working 80+ hours a week," and Musk himself will review the top 1% of applicants.

Musk's Next Steps in Politics

After taking office, Musk may focus on two things: cutting U.S. government spending and streamlining administrative agencies.

In October this year, Musk publicly stated at a rally in Madison Square Garden, New York, that he intends to cut at least $2 trillion from the federal budget. However, according to the Congressional Budget Office, of the $6.75 trillion in total federal spending for fiscal year 2024, discretionary spending, including defense, is estimated to be $1.9 trillion.

This means that, based on the current spending situation of the U.S. government, the amount Musk intends to cut is almost equal to all discretionary spending by the government.

Another thing he might do is lay off employees.

Currently, there are about 428 federal agencies in the U.S., and Musk believes that 99 of them are too many. On other occasions, Musk has publicly called for the elimination of current administrative agencies, urging his fans to tell him directly if they think there are any positions that should be cut. He also claimed that he would establish a ranking system for the most wasteful and foolish tax expenditures.

When Musk says he will lay off employees, he really will. In 2019, Musk quickly laid off 10% of SpaceX's workforce via an email, and many employees found themselves unable to log into the work system immediately after receiving it; after acquiring Twitter in 2022, Musk laid off 80%, drastically reducing the company size from 8,000 to 1,500; earlier this year, he laid off 28,000 Tesla employees.

Will the U.S. government face such layoffs in the future? What will happen to the laid-off federal employees? Will the already low efficiency of the U.S. government decrease further due to a shortage of staff? These are all questions.

Musk's plans after taking office: sending emails to every government official asking what they did this week.

Moreover, besides being a government efficiency officer, Musk may further leverage his close relationship with Trump to intervene in more U.S. politics. For instance, last Wednesday, after Trump's victory, Musk participated in the first call between Trump and Ukrainian President Zelensky.

Can layoffs really cut costs?

While it sounds appealing, Musk's ideas may not necessarily be feasible.

American political economist Francis Fukuyama published an open letter to Musk the day before yesterday, stating, "People generally believe that the federal bureaucracy is bloated and overstaffed, but that is not the case; in fact, the government is understaffed."

Since 1969, the number of federal employees in the U.S. has not significantly increased, remaining around 2.3 million, as the government has been continuously streamlining its workforce. For example, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services oversee $1.4 trillion in spending, accounting for one-fifth of the entire federal budget, but they have only 6,400 full-time employees. Meanwhile, the Office of Refugee Resettlement, responsible for resettling millions of refugees, has only 150 employees. If these personnel are cut, fraud and waste in the Medicare system may increase, and refugee situations could spiral out of control, making it difficult to accurately assess the economic losses caused by these side effects.

Additionally, some media outlets have stated that America's fiscal issues should not be left to three billionaires (referring to Musk, Trump, and Ramaswamy, all wealthy individuals), as they can only represent the interests of the privileged class, which is inherently a breeding ground for corruption.

Others have pointed out that Musk's fervor is reminiscent of the 1920s, when the last Treasury Secretary who aimed to drastically cut U.S. government spending, Andrew Mellon, averaged one layoff per day from the Treasury Department and even reduced the size of paper currency to save on printing costs. However, later historians believed that his austerity measures accelerated the onset of the Great Depression in 1929.

Trump's Cabinet

Eight years ago, when Trump was first elected president, he himself did not expect to win, so he was not well-prepared. According to the Center for Presidential Transition, the new president needs to appoint and transition about 4,000 political appointees and staff members. Because Trump had not thought through who should take what position, many appointments were made directly by the Republican Party.

But this time is different; Trump is well-prepared and has already arranged his cabinet selections.

As of now, Trump has announced the following confirmed appointments:

• Secretary of State, Marco Rubio, known for his tough stance on China, has been blacklisted and banned from entering the country.
• Attorney General, Matt Gaetz, a Congressman from Florida, is under investigation for rape and sexual assault of minors and for misappropriating campaign funds.
• Secretary of Defense, Pete Hegseth, a U.S. Army veteran and Fox News host, previously held the rank of major in the military.
• Secretary of Health, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., an environmental lawyer and anti-vaccine activist.

Trump has also stated that upon taking office, he will further increase tariffs on China, force Nvidia to shift chip manufacturing back to the U.S., and repeal the Biden administration's executive orders limiting AI development. However, on the other hand, Trump is one of the few politicians who has stated, "I will never ban TikTok," and his election may bring a glimmer of hope for the TikTok ban.

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