Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy: The Doge Plan to Reform Government

Cutting staff is a dumb move, they make up like 5% of the Federal budget [0]. I've seen it in large companies where they target some layoff percentage and then realize a little later they need some people and they come back as contractors and it costs more. I don't see how thinking about government services with a startup or entrepreneurial mindset will be helpful.

There does need to be about $1800 billion cut to just get to a balanced budget, but cutting 1% (say 20% of workforce) by laying off people will get you maybe $65B. Where will the other $1735 billion needed come from then?

[0] a quick google/gemini result: In 2022, 4.3% of the US federal budget was spent on pay and benefits for federal workers