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Billionaire Elon Musk is helping the Trump administration orchestrate mass firings of thousands of federal workers. That's been the centerpiece of Musk's Department of Government Efficiency, a team focused on slashing costs. And it's a tactic Musk has used in his business career. But as NPR's Bobby Allyn reports, the Silicon Valley-style moves are up against different realities in the federal government.
BOBBY ALLYN, BYLINE: In the past month, Musk has gleefully posted on X about sacking federal workers and pulling apart entire agencies. Talking to Fox News host Sean Hannity Tuesday night, Musk said this is what the mass layoffs are about.
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ELON MUSK: In order to save taxpayer money, it comes down to two things - competence and caring.
ALLYN: Musk claims you have to care enough to find ways to cut spending, and you have to be competent enough to figure out how. As to opposition from Democratic lawmakers, some judges and government workers who are suing?
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MUSK: I guess we must be over the target of doing something right, you know? Like, they wouldn't be complaining so much if they - we weren't doing something useful, I think.
ALLYN: In Silicon Valley, when tech companies need to cut costs, firing lots of people is a useful way to save money. Musk, who runs six companies, knows this. After Musk bought Twitter in 2022, he got rid of 80% of the staff. That's because for many tech companies, employee salaries and benefits are the No. 1 expense. Not so in the federal government, where personnel costs make up just about 4% of the entire budget.
MAX STIER: The idea that this exercise of slashing the headcount of the federal workforce is about cost savings makes no sense. And it makes no sense because it is not the primary cost center.
ALLYN: That's Max Stier. He runs the Partnership for Public Service. It's a nonprofit focused on improving government. He says there are about 2 million federal employees nationwide.
STIER: People should know that's about the same size as it was in 1969. So headcount has actually not grown even in absolute terms, and it's shrunk in relative terms to the whole population.
ALLYN: A recent Washington Post estimate put it another way. Laying off a quarter of the entire federal workforce would only reduce federal spending by 1%. So if slashing civil servants isn't going to save much money, then why has Musk launched a campaign against rank-and-file workers? I asked author and historian Thomas Frank this question. His 2008 book, "The Wrecking Crew," examined how Presidents Ronald Reagan and George W. Bush also tried to declaw the federal bureaucracy. Frank says what Musk and DOGE are doing are part of a long conservative tradition.
THOMAS FRANK: The Chamber of Commerce had a slogan back in the 1920s. They used to say, more business in government, less government in business. And this has always been kind of close to the heart of how Republicans have administered the state.
ALLYN: In other words, replace career government workers with business types under the banner of saving money. Trump has also made his personal resentment of what he calls the deep state clear. He insists the federal bureaucracy is undermining him out of political animosity, which is why Musk has tapped loyalists as part of DOGE. They're a crew of mostly Silicon Valley engineers and managers trying to terminate staff and completely dismantle agencies. Frank says what Musk and DOGE are doing to shrink the size of government already goes well beyond what past Republican administrations tried to accomplish thanks to Trump's buy-in.
FRANK: He is this embodiment of this long-standing Republican dream. In a lot of ways, he's doing a lot of the same things that Ronald Reagan set out to do, that George W. Bush set out to do. Only, he's doing it a lot more forcefully.
ALLYN: Frank says if Trump and Musk really want to cut government costs, they'll have to find ways to attack the biggest government expenses, Social Security, health care and defense. Together, that's 60% of U.S. spending.
Bobby Allyn, NPR News. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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