Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency continues to rip through the federal bureaucracy. Certainly, the backlash is growing, but given the size of the U.S. debt, it is either austerity now on our terms or a far more chaotic accounting later. There will be pain. When Greece faced austerity in 2010, its economy shrank by a quarter, and unemployment exceeded 30%. Within a few years, its economy was growing, as was per capita income. The same crowds who protested the center-right for cuts now reward it for restarting Greece’s economic engine.

While many Americans may complain about efforts to return fiscal responsibility to government and to jump-start the economy by reducing the tax burden, even the most spendthrift members of Congress appear to be fiscal conservatives next to the United Nation’s bloated bureaucracy. United Nations expenditures today exceed those of more than 100 countries; while the U.N.’s lobbyists and those on its gravy train say its budget is just $3 billion, this is false as it ignores its various organs and agencies. Since socialist and former Portuguese Prime Minister Antonio Guterres became secretary-general and began to jet around the globe, the U.N.’s total expenditures have increased rapidly, growing by almost 12% or $7 billion between 2021 and 2022.

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If the U.N. is to function, Musk and Secretary of State Marco Rubio should unleash DOGE upon it, compelling cooperation by threatening to withhold its $18.1 billion in U.S. funds. In December, Hugh Dugan, a former U.S. delegate to the United Nations, proposed a DOGE-UN. So, too, has scholar and lawyer Anne Bayefsky. They are right.

My American Enterprise Institute colleagues Danielle Pletka and Brett Schaefer have followed the United Nations for years and had clear examples of U.N. waste at their fingertips. Even the U.N., at some level, understands what a boondoggle it has become. When the U.N. brags about its essential role, how many U.N. bureaucrats cite the “Committee on Soups and Broth”? What chaos could descend upon the world if it did not bless society with its “proposed draft standard for soups and broths elaborated by Switzerland and the International Association of Soup Manufacturers”?

In an age of email or, for that matter, FedEx and DHL, why does the United Nations need its own postal service? Sure, souvenirs for its gift shop are nice, but investing tens of millions of dollars in an agency to sell stamps for a couple dollars to tourists hardly seems like a necessity or proper stewardship of international donations.

Perhaps when DOGE unleashes its artificial intelligence tools at the U.N.’s travel office, it can reveal just how much the U.N. spends on airfare broken down by first class, business class, and economy. (Hint: Economy likely won’t be the highest budget item.) Maybe it can discover how much Guterres has spent on personal travel at a time he could appear on Zoom for perhaps a 100% reduction in cost?

Part of Musk’s logic is the United States should not replicate on the public dime any institution that already exists outside the government. It is a compelling logic that could also apply to the United Nations.

CONGRESSIONAL DISTRICTS BEYOND THE DC AREA EXPECTING FALLOUT FROM DOGE CUTS

Why does the United Nations, for example, need to sponsor its own university? The U.N. University in Japan describes itself as a global think tank and center for post-graduate study. If it is worth its investment, how much knowledge has it actually contributed? Has it contributed to cures for cancer like Israel’s Technion or Johns Hopkins University? Has it produced Nobel Prize-winning economists?

The U.N.’s value is in its core function: providing a place for all countries to come and quietly speak. Over the decades, it has subordinated its mission to become the world’s largest self-licking ice cream cone. The world deserves better. While the U.N. often argues it needs more funds for its operations, its expenditures belie its words. The U.N. needs DOGE now.

Michael Rubin is a contributor to the Washington Examiner’s Beltway Confidential blog. He is director of analysis at the Middle East Forum and a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute.