Is Musk the right person to lead the government’s money-saving efforts?
By: Marlo Shah
With the inauguration of President Trump, tech CEO Elon Musk assumed a new role as head of the unofficial Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE). Since DOGE’s mandate is to reduce government spending, Musk’s track record for cutting costs in his personal businesses has earned him control of an agency with a mission to slash budgets throughout the federal government. That being said, while Musk’s style for cutting costs sometimes works for his businesses, it is risky for him to apply these strategies to the government funds as leader of DOGE.
Musk’s approach to cutting costs in his businesses have often been harsh and sometimes ineffective. Historically, Musk has successfully cut costs from many of his companies, including X (formerly named Twitter), SpaceX, and Tesla. Still, the methods he used to achieve savings were often extreme and short-sighted. Musk cuts business expenses with the belief that he can cut whatever he wants and deal with the consequences later. This ideology has negatively affected his companies and employees, leading to him making several mistakes in the process. Musk’s most significant and harshest cuts were the ones he made at X, just days after he purchased it in October 2022. Upon buying the company, Musk’s first action was to lay off roughly 6,500 of its 8,000 workers, refusing to pay the terminated employees’ bonuses due the following month. According to three members of a company conference call focused on company spending, the multi-billionaire appeared angry at how much money was being spent. Musk later tried to re-hire some of the employees he had let go, evidently having realized he made a mistake. Following the devastating layoffs, Musk began to cut costs in other aspects of the business, including refusing to pay for janitorial services in X’s office buildings. This led to unsanitary conditions for the employees, such as overfilled trash cans and no toilet paper in the bathrooms. He had also personally pulled the plug on a server in a building that he no longer wanted to pay for, in an attempt to expedite the process of moving out. This rash action led to a malfunction on X, meaning that employees had to work over the holidays to fix this issue. At his electric car company, Tesla, Musk chose to get rid of expensive technology that provided the car with laser sensors, instead opting for cheaper sensors that saw only as well as the human eyes. This frugality led to safety concerns and possibly caused several accidents, including one that resulted in the death of a pedestrian.
How Musk leads and cuts costs from his companies is a clear indication of what he would do if given the power to cut government spending, and his public statements have confirmed that he plans similarly drastic and sudden government cuts for anything he deems inefficient as head of DOGE. In November 2024, Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy–who was expected to co-direct DOGE with Musk but has since withdrawn from that role–released an article in the Wall Street Journal detailing some of their cost-cutting targets within the government. They previewed that they wanted to lay off many government employees, as Musk had done at his companies, a strategy that could negatively impact the federal government’s effectiveness and the livelihood of those who lose their jobs. They targeted federal funding for programs unauthorized by Congress, the largest of which provides healthcare for veterans. They also listed specific organizations that receive government funding, including The Corporation for Public Broadcasting, which receives about $535 million a year; international organizations which receive $1.5 billion in grants, and so-called “progressive groups” like Planned Parenthood which receive nearly $300 million a year. These programs all have specific functions within the government that many people rely on, even if they don’t align with Musk’s political ideals. By calling out these more liberal groups, Musk and Ramaswamy highlighted their intentions to use DOGE to promote the far-right agenda, dismissing the overall wellbeing of the country in favor of politicizing welfare programs.
Musk wearing a MAGA hat while listening to a Trump campaign speech
Making snap decisions about cost-cutting leads to mistakes, as when Musk realized that he had cut too much of X’s workforce. Errors like that have a much greater impact if the targeted programs provide essential government services, rather than a social media website, as there are many lives that depend on government support. Musk made mistakes with DOGE before President Trump was even inaugurated. Amidst the excitement and boastful talk surrounding the supposed department, he declared that DOGE could cut around $2 trillion from government spending. This claim raised skepticism from experts, as the federal budget is only $6.75 trillion, so Musk claimed he could chop down spending by nearly one-third. In a recent interview, Musk dramatically reduced his goal, saying, “if we try for two trillion, we’ve got a good shot at getting one.” That kind of carelessness could have devastating effects when critical government infrastructure is at stake, especially when dealing with money at this scale. With someone so ignorant to the consequences of his own actions and mistakes in charge of federal funds, many programs critical to the overall function of the United States could be damaged, on top of federal workers being cut to the point that the government, similar to Musk’s own companies, struggle and become incompetent simply for the sake of cutting costs.
Elon Musk may think he can shoot from the hip and gamble with his own companies and money, but the affairs of the U.S. can not be treated the same way. The success of Musk’s companies is not imperative to the survival and union of a whole country in the way the U.S. government functions. Cutting programs that Musk finds “irrelevant” will terminate essential initiatives that millions of people rely on, both inside and outside of the United States. For Musk, this is a matter of efficiency, for others, government programs are an essential aspect of their livelihood. Musk has already pushed for the defunding of issues that do not align with his and President Trump’s political views, such as DEI efforts in the government and foreign aid. These programs were crucial for the well-being of countless people who will now struggle due to Musk’s actions. By allowing Musk this much power, Americans have signed away their access to a stable government, a good economy, and various crucial programs that could now be defunded. Musk has proved to be reckless with his own money and companies, something that the wealthiest person in the world might be able to get away with. However, Musk’s cut-first, fix-later strategy may leave us all to pay the price.
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