As the Trump administration prepares to head to Washington in January, there have been lots of headlines about the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) that will be led by Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy. The duo have promised to thoroughly review the current federal government apparatus to make recommendations for regulatory and spending cuts.
Musk and Ramaswamy outlined their vision for DOGE in an article they wrote in the Wall Street Journal last week. They said they are outside volunteers and will not be federal employees or federal officials and that they will be assisting with identifying and hiring a team to work with the Office of Management and Budget to “pursue three major kinds of reform: regulatory rescissions, administrative reductions and cost savings.”
Regulatory Reforms
DOGE will operate on the premise that most rules and regulations are not enacted by Congress through the prescribed legal process outlined in the Constitution but instead by “millions of unelected, unappointed civil servants within government agencies who view themselves as immune from firing thanks to civil-service protections.”
Musk and Ramaswamy make the case in their article that the Supreme Court has held that this is unconstitutional with respect to regulations enacted by federal agencies that deal with “major economic or policy questions.” They intend to identify and present this list of regulations to President Trump to “immediately pause the enforcement of those regulations [by executive action] and initiate the process for review and rescission.”
Proposed Federal Workforce Cuts
Musk and Ramaswamy state that if there is a mass elimination of unnecessary federal regulations being dictated and overseen by federal agencies, then there will be fewer federal employees needed to work in those agencies to carry out enforcement of those regulations.
They wrote, “DOGE intends to work with embedded appointees in agencies to identify the minimum number of employees required at an agency for it to perform its constitutionally permissible and statutorily mandated functions.”
The goal is to see any federal employees who lose their jobs as part of this process to transition to private sector employment. The article states, “Employees whose positions are eliminated deserve to be treated with respect, and DOGE’s goal is to help support their transition into the private sector. The president can use existing laws to give them incentives for early retirement and to make voluntary severance payments to facilitate a graceful exit.”
They also allude to restructuring competitive service rules to facilitate downsizing the federal workforce, likely a reference to bringing back Schedule F, something the Trump administration is likely to do.
RIFs and VERA
Two possible procedures that this could be referring to are Reduction in Force (RIF) and Voluntary Early Retirement Authority (VERA). However, neither are simple nor uncomplicated.
Reduction in Force (RIF)
When a federal agency has to abolish positions, RIF regulations determine if an employee remains in the same job. Some employees will have the right move into a different position but remain employed in a federal job.
A RIF is a way to restructure an agency. Some people will lose their jobs. Some people will move into different jobs. Applying the RIF regulations determines who goes and who stays.
For more information about RIFs, see What is a RIF and How Does It Work?.
VERA
According to the Office of Personnel Management (OPM):
Voluntary Early Retirement Authority (VERA) allows agencies that are undergoing substantial restructuring, reshaping, downsizing, transfer of function, or reorganization to temporarily lower the age and service requirements in order to increase the number of employees eligible for retirement. The authority encourages more voluntary separations and helps the agency complete the needed organizational change with minimal disruption to the work force. By offering these short term opportunities, an agency can make it possible for employees to receive an immediate annuity years before they would otherwise be eligible.
An agency must request VERA and receive approval from the Office of Personnel Management (OPM) before the agency may offer early retirement to its employees. The approval from OPM will stipulate a period of time during which the option will remain available. Agencies such as the Department of Defense that have been granted agency-specific VERA are not required to seek OPM approval for their use of this option.
Scaling Back Telework
Musk and Ramaswamy also state in their article about DOGE that they plan to recommend federal employees return to in-office work five days per week. They wrote, “Requiring federal employees to come to the office five days a week would result in a wave of voluntary terminations that we welcome: If federal employees don’t want to show up, American taxpayers shouldn’t pay them for the Covid-era privilege of staying home.”
They may be right. The Government Accountability Office recently published a report on telework in which the four agencies that were studied told GAO that they found telework beneficial with respect to recruiting.
Will DOGE Succeed?
How likely DOGE is to succeed in its stated goals is anybody’s guess at this point. The intent of DOGE is for it to be a short-lived venture; the stated goal is to sunset the project on July 4, 2026. Musk and Ramaswamy seem sincere in their beliefs and are obviously optimistic about their ability to enact meaningful reductions in federal spending.
They have some other political advantages, too, in an apparently willing incoming president who wants to cut spending and regulations and Republicans in control of both the House and Senate. House Oversight Committee Chairman James Comer (R-KY) said he plans to establish a subcommittee to work with DOGE to investigate unnecessary government spending and look at ways to restructure federal agencies.
However, things move slowly in Washington and change does not come easily. Remember the National Commission on Fiscal Responsibility and Reform (a.k.a. Deficit Commission) established by President Obama? It was “charged with identifying policies to improve the fiscal situation in the medium term and to achieve fiscal sustainability over the long run.”
Not much came of it though. In the draft report that it published, it recommended freezing federal employee salaries and making federal workforce cuts, among other things. That was in 2010.
At that time, the average federal employee salary, according to the Office of Personnel Management, was $74,307, and there were 2,113,210 total federal employees. As of March 2024, OPM reports that there are now 2,278,730 total federal employees, and the average salary is $106,382. So, despite the recommendations of the Deficit Commission, the federal workforce has grown by 7.8%, and the average federal employee salary has increased by 43%.
Also, since 2015, five years after the Deficit Commission released its first report, the number of locality pay areas has increased by 71%. When more federal employees receive locality pay, it ultimately boosts their annual salaries.
The federal debt at the end of 2010 was $13.6 trillion. At the end of last week, it was announced that it broke $36 trillion.
There are many sensational headlines about the draconian nature of the cuts being proposed by Musk and Ramaswamy and the DOGE operation. There may be cuts enacted, but it’s much too soon to make assumptions about what will happen in Washington.
