Donald Trump has tasked Elon Musk, the richest man in the world, with leading the new Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE).
Trump stated on social media that Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy, former candidate in the Republican Party primaries, “will dismantle the government bureaucracy, will reduce excessive regulations”They will cut unnecessary spending and restructure federal agencies.”
The technology entrepreneur has extensive corporate leadership experience to achieve this objective that he has been defending for months.
But his role would also give him an important influence over government policy and the regulatory environment in which their companies operate, which raises reasonable doubts.
What is known about DOGE
At the moment, few concrete details are known about the next Department of Government Efficiency, which Trump called in a statement “the Manhattan Project of our time.”
The president-elect has announced that the DOGE will function as a kind of advisory council that will operate externally through a partnership with the White House Office of Management and Budget (OMB).
The department, Trump announced, “will provide advice and guidance from outside the government, and partner with the White House and the Office of Management and Budget to drive large-scale structural reform and create a business-like approach to government never seen before.” .
“I hope that Elon and Vivek will make changes to the federal bureaucracy for efficiency while improving the lives of all Americans. “Importantly, we will eliminate the massive waste and fraud that exists in our $6.5 trillion annual government spending,” he added.
And, in principle, it will not be permanent: Trump estimates that the body will complete its work in 18 monthsand Musk believes he will do it “much faster.”
For his part, Musk stated at a rally for the then-Republican candidate in October that the US government budget could be reduced by “at least” $2 trillion out of a total of $6.5 trillion.
He has also frequently suggested that the number of government employees could be significantly reduced.
For his part, Ramaswamy has in the past expressed his desire to eliminate a number of federal offices, including the Department of Education, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, the Internal Revenue Service and the FBI.
The Twitter/X precedent
If anything, the way Musk has run his own companies may provide clues as to what Americans can expect him to do on DOGE.
In October 2022 he took over the social media platform Twitter, which he renamed Xin a $44 billion deal.
Musk waived content moderation policies and removed the ban on users deemed violators of rules on hate speech and misinformation.
One of the users it reinstated was Trump, whose profile had been censored following the Capitol riot in January 2021 for continuing to claim that the 2020 election had been rigged against him.
Musk’s acquisition brought radical changes to X, such as workforce reduction from about 8,000 people to 1,500.
In April 2023 he told the BBC that his reasoning for taking this measure was that “if the whole company goes under, then no one will have a job.”
“Their idea of efficiency was to fire a lot of people,” says Alex Waddan, a professor of American politics at the University of Leicester.
In response to the exodus of advertisers for relaxing the platform’s freedom of expression policies, the businessman monetized some features to increase revenue.
It turned blue ticks, which previously indicated that a public figure’s account was authentic, into a subscription model and linked advertising payments to “verified” users with the number of interactions received.
But these changes had some unintended consequences.
After a barrage of criticism, X assigned gold or silver marks to official accounts to prevent them from being confused with fake ones, meaning that blue marks only indicate that an account is paid.
Incentivizing users with a portion of advertising revenue also provided an avenue for so-called “bot farms” to make money from interactions with their automatically generated content. Musk has said his team has repeatedly removed bot accounts.
Critics maintain that his changes have given prominence to hate speech and misinformation, although he maintains that the social network is politically neutral.
“As a ‘serial entrepreneur,’ Musk has been relentless in its attempt to improve institutional efficiency in their own companies,” evaluates Thomas Gift, professor of Political Science and director of the Center for American Politics at University College London.
He adds that while Musk’s main role will be to “reduce the tangle of bureaucracy that is the United States federal government,” his position will also give him influence in the new administration.
“While his role in the Department of Government Efficiency will be more informal, there is no doubt that Trump listens to himat least for the moment,” he says.
Musk against regulations
Elon Musk “is extremely anti-regulation and hates being told what to do by the government or anyone else“, described investigative journalist Kristen Grind in the podcast The Daily from the American newspaper The New York Times.
The acronym DOGE devised by Musk refers to a meme of a Shiba Inu dog that later gave its name to the Dogecoin cryptocurrency. He has mentioned both frequently.
Christopher Phelps, professor of modern American political history, interprets the name to be “a nod to cryptocurrency deregulation as part of their plans.”
Cryptocurrency prices rose after Trump’s election, suggesting that the incoming president will create a relaxed regulatory environment.
But Musk’s deregulatory calls can also be attributed in part to frustrations he has endured with his other business ventures: electric vehicle company Tesla and rocket firm SpaceX.
The US government has repeatedly accused Tesla of try to prevent their workers from unionizingwhich in some cases could violate federal law.
Musk, whose estimated net worth is as high as $290 billion, has previously stated that he is “not against all unions,” but that the auto workers union “has a history of destroying productivity that prevents a company from competing.” .
In September, Musk threatened to sue the Federal Aviation Administration over plans to fine his company SpaceX $633,000 for alleged licensing violations related to some of its rocket launches from Cape Canaveral, Florida.
He accused the agency of “regulatory overreach”.
He has also repeatedly said that wants to colonize Marsand SpaceX’s Starship program is an attempt to make this possible.
But in September he wrote that this was only a possibility “as long as it is not stifled by bureaucracy” and stated that the creation of DOGE was “the only path to extending life beyond Earth.”
Altruism or interest?
So to what extent is your motivation for taking on the government role driven by your business interests?
Musk “will personally benefit from much of the deregulation he promotes,” says Professor Phelps.
“I think putting someone who is a billionaire and runs large corporations in charge of a federal deregulation project is, by nature, fraught with conflicts of interest“.
For his part, Professor Gift notes that “there is no doubt that Musk has significant vested interests in the US regulatory landscape as a result of his many business ventures.”
At the same time, he clarifies, “it is difficult to affirm that this is the only reason that drives it.”
“Musk has taken enormous personal and political risks by coming out for Trump, and many of his activities and rhetoric appear to show an ideologically committed individual with causes he believes in.”
Professor Waddan agrees with this view: “You clearly have a stake and self-interest, but you can equally honestly believe that there is too much regulation and too much government bureaucracy.”
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