Elon Musk’s DOGE Already Has One Target in Mind: Eliminating Remote Work for Federal Employees

  • Musk plans to implement a controversial downsizing strategy for federal employees. This strategy, known as “covert layoffs,” has been criticized in the private sector.

  • Although the law prohibits the dismissal of federal workers, Musk has found a loophole: “reductions in force.”

Elon Musk
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Tesla CEO Elon Musk has been one of the strongest opponents of remote work. He opposed it even during the challenging times of coronavirus stay-at-home orders, when many companies now planning to return to the office had promised permanent remote work options.

Musk will lead the newly established Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE). It appears that DOGE will adopt the policies he’s implemented in his own companies, including reducing the number of federal employees and eliminating remote work.

Back to the office. In an op-ed for The Wall Street Journal, Musk revealed that one of DOGE’s initial priorities is to reduce federal staff, particularly those working remotely or in hybrid models.

“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,” he said.

Two million federal workers under scrutiny. According to a congressional report, the federal government oversees about 2.28 million federal employees, in addition to military and postal personnel who aren’t included in this count. Of these staffers, about 1.2 million work from a government office (54%), while 1.1 million hold positions that are eligible for remote work. Currently, around 228,000 employees (10%) work remotely on a daily basis.

In his opinion piece, Musk says that DOGE aims for “mass head-count reductions across the federal bureaucracy.” One proposed strategy is to encourage the resignations of federal employees who are unwilling or unable to return to government offices. This approach is similar to tactics some HR managers in large companies have utilized to streamline their workforces.

Incentivized to transition to the private sector. Musk added that those employees who lose their positions due to job elimination will receive fair compensation.

“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,” he said.

Business tactics for government. In his letter appointing biotech investor Vivek Ramaswamy and Musk as heads of DOGE, President-elect Donald Trump made it clear that he intends to adopt an “entrepreneurial approach” to governing the country.

In line with this vision, Musk is focusing his downsizing strategy on his entrepreneurial experiences. Following his acquisition of Twitter, he laid off 80% of its workforce. Similarly, he cut Tesla’s entire Supercharger department and optimized the manufacturing and launch of his Starlink satellites.

With the public announcement that federal employees will have to return to the office as a means to reduce the workforce at no cost, Musk positions himself in stark contrast to managers at companies like Amazon. In fact, Amazon CEO Andy Jassy recently denied accusations of “backdoor layoffs” following his return-to-office policies.

Firing federal employees. Officially, U.S. law doesn’t allow for the direct firing of federal officials to protect them from political retaliation for their actions. However, according to Musk, the law does permit the statute to implement “reductions in force” that don’t target specific individuals.

Since the DOGE’s goal is to reduce the number of regulations and state agencies, the positions of these federal employees would effectively become obsolete, allowing the government to eliminate them.

Image | NASA Kennedy

Related | Elon Musk Purchased Twitter for $44 Billion and Laid Off 80% of Its Workforce. Two Years Later, He’s Still Bragging About It

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