Three months after being trained, the government’s Ministry of Efficiency (DOGE) may not live up to its name, according to the New York Times.
The agency, created via the executive decree by President Donald Trump in January, was responsible for reducing the federal budget and wandering “fraud, waste and alleged abuse”. However, while Doge Elon Musk is preparing to leave Washington and take a step back from the agency, the Times reports that the alleged “economies” created by DOGE are minimal.
On Monday, the DOGE website said it saved around 160 billion dollars through “combination of asset sales, contractual / lease cancellations and renegotiations, fraud and deletion of inappropriate payment, cancellations of subsidies, interest savings, programmatic changes, regulatory savings and labor reductions.” This number is much lower than 2 billions of dollars of Savings Musk initially said that he could find and lower than the savings of 1 dollars that he offered after making a return to his original silhouette.
Earlier this month, Musk admitted at a meeting of the firm with Trump that Doge is likely to report savings of $ 150 billion for next year’s budget budget.
But according to a study by The Partnership for Public Service, the cost of carrying out these cuts came from around $ 135 billion for this exercise. The partnership for the public service is a non-profit organization that studies federal workforce. The organization used “budget figures to produce an approximate estimate” concerning the costs of all layoffs, re -evaluation, loss of productivity and the paid leave of thousands of workers caused by DOGE CUTS.
In addition to these costs, the reductions of the internal returned service which led 22,000 employees to leave will cost the agency for around 8.5 billion in revenues in 2026, according to the LAB budget of the University of Yale. Combined with $ 135 billion in other costs and it seems that the cost of Doge cuts reaches around $ 143.5 billion.
This total does not include the costs associated with the numerous proceedings which have been deposited in response to the actions of Doge, which also cost the government’s time and money.
“It is important to realize that doing nothing also has a cost, and these so-called experts and groups are conveniently absent when you consider the costs of doing nothing,” said White House spokesman Harrison W. Fields, in Times.
Doge cuts should also be less expensive in the years to come, as initial costs can be more than future costs.
While Musk continues to praise Doge’s efforts, the value of the brought back has been questioned. The New York Times previously reported that one claimed that savings involved DOGE canceling a contract that did not exist. The “contract” was in fact a proposal that had not been finalized, but the agency pointed out as an economy of more than $ 300 million, according to Times.
DOGE also asked for the credit for a canceled contract which was canceled when former President Joe Biden was in office. A subsidy reported by $ 1.75 billion for a non -profitable vaccine organization was canceled and listed as an economy, but the non -profit organization said it had already been paid in full, which means that the savings were 0 $.
Musk is expected to end his time as a special government employee next month, because he is only allowed to work for 130 days in this role.
Several government offices in Michigan have been closed as part of DOGE’s efforts, as well as the cancellation of subsidies and contracts.
