President Trump has run into some headwinds in reducing the cost of the oversized government workforce. A federal judge in Massachusetts postponed the midnight deadline on Thursday, Feb. 6, for the federal workers’ buyout opportunity. On Monday, there will be a hearing to determine whether the Office of Personnel Management (OPM) directive to offer the buyout will stand.
If the goal is paring down the size of government, there are two approaches. First, getting rid of government functions that no longer serve the public interest eliminates the cost of the facility and the government employees engaged in the effort. The second method is simply implementing a salami-sliced cut as a percentage of the workforce. The former is generally more effective as it has the benefit of being easier to defend. If a function is no longer needed or is of little value, continuing to feed it makes no sense to most taxpayers. President Donald Trump chose a variation on number two.
As part of his first month’s flurry of presidential decisions, Trump attacked the bloat and waste by offering government employees buyouts to leave their jobs. It’s a sweet deal for those with enough years to retire or those looking for different lines of work in the private sector. The OPM explained in a Jan. 28 memorandum:
“This program begins effective January 28 and is available to all federal employees until February 6. If you resign under this program, you will retain all pay and benefits regardless of your daily workload and will be exempted from all applicable in-person work requirements until September 30, 2025 (or earlier if you choose to accelerate your resignation for any reason).”
There are exceptions to the program. The government workers exempted from the “deferred resignation” plan include “military personnel of the armed forces, employees of the US Postal Service, those in positions related to immigration enforcement and national security, and those in any other positions specifically excluded by your employing agency.” The point of the Trump government personnel reduction initiative is to save the taxpayers money by allowing government workers to volunteer to seek other employment in the private sector. Since reporting from inside the Washington, DC, beltway reveals that only 6% of government employees showed up to the office regularly during the Biden administration, unloading the absent workers would probably not impact the government’s effectiveness. Remember the well-used mantra “virtual presence is actual absence.”
Unfortunately, there are those in government and the legislature who want to waste taxpayer dollars. “The American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees (AFSCME) and along with other unions for public employees — represented by legal group Democracy Forward — filed a lawsuit against the OPM Tuesday to block the buyout offer, calling it ‘illegal’ and ‘an arbitrary, unlawful, short-fused ultimatum’ in a press release,” the Daily Caller reported. Whether the generous deal offered by the Trump administration is everything the AFSCME claims it is will be resolved when a judge hears the arguments.
What we do know is that “More than 40,000 federal employees have taken the Trump administration up on its buyout offer, a spokesperson for the Office of Personnel Management said Thursday,” according to Business Insider. However, by the deadline on Thursday, Feb. 6, 11:59 p.m., the final tally had grown by 50%. “More than 60,000 workers had already accepted what’s formally known as a ‘deferred resignation’ as of Thursday afternoon, according to a senior administration official,” NBC News confirmed. If the judge hearing the case decides to extend the time frame in which federal employees can choose to take the offer, significantly more federal employees will likely take the deal.
There is a mantra that says it takes as much effort to eliminate a bad idea as it does to promote a good one, maybe more. The Trump administration is learning that a cadre of government workers are delighted to waste taxpayers’ money and will use any means to feed at the public trough. White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt looked at the bright side of the Massachusetts judge’s order, explaining in a statement, “We are grateful to the judge for extending the deadline so more federal workers who refuse to show up to the office can take the Administration up on this very generous, once-in-a-lifetime offer.” The statistic that on any given day, a small percentage of the federal workforce is physically at their place of work is more than ample evidence that a vast number of federal workers are in excess. No private sector corporation would put up with that waste. Why should the American taxpayers?
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