Trump layoffs of fed workers will fundamentally change DC

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I agree that these layoffs will fundamentally change DC. I think the layoffs will be rescinded within weeks, as lawsuits wind their way through agencies and courts. But I think the shock of Musk taking a wrecking ball to one of the pillars of civil service, job security, will be felt for years to come. He has no idea what he has done and will never know, because soon enough he'll be off to another project, leaving DC behind. Even if he is fined for some of the illegalities he has committed, he'll just pay it and then never think of federal employees again.

This is going to stain the Republican party, too. Have they figured that out yet? Or are they still too petrified of Trump/Musk to think farther ahead than tomorrow?

Why on earth would we want job security to be a pillar of civil service. “Work for the gov! There’s no performance standard!” has been the MO for eternity and resulted in disgusting bloat. Being better, more efficient, and less costly is actively disincentivized. The fed is best portrayed as the guy from Office Space working out of a basement storage room endlessly looking for his stapler.

It's going to wreck the DC economy. Get ready for a lot more empty storefronts, restaurant and bar closures and a generally more depressing city.

DC will raise taxes on everyone else to make up for what's not being paid by the newly unemployed. Get ready for $500 speeding tickets.

[Anonymous]

At a minimum, DC needs to get serious about combatting crime. It’s just about the only thing it can control. We can’t afford to play around with restorative justice when the economy is also getting gutted.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:At a minimum, DC needs to get serious about combatting crime. It’s just about the only thing it can control. We can’t afford to play around with restorative justice when the economy is also getting gutted.

Someone was just robbed of a Canada Goose jacket up by Sidwell this evening, men with guns in a likely stolen car. Busy area during rush hour, brazen. Curbing the online marketplaces for stolen goods would also be helpful imo.

[Anonymous]

All these idiots parroting the line about bloated govt. Look at the trend here, it's basically flat and includes military employees as well. If we account for the population increase govt actually has shrunk significantly.

I don't even work for the govt just sick of hearing uneducated idiots bleating out this never-ending nonsense.

We have supercomputers in our pockets, AI, etc. and can't bother to actually engage our brains and let them be smoothed out by stupid sound bites.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:At a minimum, DC needs to get serious about combatting crime. It’s just about the only thing it can control. We can’t afford to play around with restorative justice when the economy is also getting gutted.

Someone was just robbed of a Canada Goose jacket up by Sidwell this evening, men with guns in a likely stolen car. Busy area during rush hour, brazen. Curbing the online marketplaces for stolen goods would also be helpful imo.

The people of Ward 3 need to think carefully about who to support in 2026. We cannot afford another social justice warrior.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:At a minimum, DC needs to get serious about combatting crime. It’s just about the only thing it can control. We can’t afford to play around with restorative justice when the economy is also getting gutted.

Someone was just robbed of a Canada Goose jacket up by Sidwell this evening, men with guns in a likely stolen car. Busy area during rush hour, brazen. Curbing the online marketplaces for stolen goods would also be helpful imo.

The people of Ward 3 need to think carefully about who to support in 2026. We cannot afford another social justice warrior.

Instead we need a bootlicker of billionaires. I'm sure if we just suck up a little bit more then they'll see how cool we really are.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:At a minimum, DC needs to get serious about combatting crime. It’s just about the only thing it can control. We can’t afford to play around with restorative justice when the economy is also getting gutted.

Someone was just robbed of a Canada Goose jacket up by Sidwell this evening, men with guns in a likely stolen car. Busy area during rush hour, brazen. Curbing the online marketplaces for stolen goods would also be helpful imo.

The people of Ward 3 need to think carefully about who to support in 2026. We cannot afford another social justice warrior.

Instead we need a bootlicker of billionaires. I'm sure if we just suck up a little bit more then they'll see how cool we really are.

This has nothing to do with Trump and everything to do with stopping young thugs tearing winter coats off people backs in broad daylight. There’s acres of space between billionaires bootlickers and social justice warriors. It’s a nice place and you should check it out.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don’t think it’s going to amount to that much on a macro level (not downplaying the effect on families). I don’t think dc economy or real estate will end up that impacted.

Well, you're wrong. In December, there were 20,000 people unemployed in the District. So far, 75,000 federal workers have taken the buyout and hundreds of thousands could be laid off because they are probationary. Obviously only a fraction of them live in DC. But it wouldn't take much for the number of unemployed people to reach levels unseen in many decades.

Almost everyone who took the Fork was retirement eligible or had another job so no part of the unemployment numbers. But the probationary employees are obviously different. It’s not clear to me how many live in DC versus MD, VA or other states.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I agree that these layoffs will fundamentally change DC. I think the layoffs will be rescinded within weeks, as lawsuits wind their way through agencies and courts. But I think the shock of Musk taking a wrecking ball to one of the pillars of civil service, job security, will be felt for years to come. He has no idea what he has done and will never know, because soon enough he'll be off to another project, leaving DC behind. Even if he is fined for some of the illegalities he has committed, he'll just pay it and then never think of federal employees again.

This is going to stain the Republican party, too. Have they figured that out yet? Or are they still too petrified of Trump/Musk to think farther ahead than tomorrow?

Why on earth would we want job security to be a pillar of civil service. “Work for the gov! There’s no performance standard!” has been the MO for eternity and resulted in disgusting bloat. Being better, more efficient, and less costly is actively disincentivized. The fed is best portrayed as the guy from Office Space working out of a basement storage room endlessly looking for his stapler.

+1000

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I agree that these layoffs will fundamentally change DC. I think the layoffs will be rescinded within weeks, as lawsuits wind their way through agencies and courts. But I think the shock of Musk taking a wrecking ball to one of the pillars of civil service, job security, will be felt for years to come. He has no idea what he has done and will never know, because soon enough he'll be off to another project, leaving DC behind. Even if he is fined for some of the illegalities he has committed, he'll just pay it and then never think of federal employees again.

This is going to stain the Republican party, too. Have they figured that out yet? Or are they still too petrified of Trump/Musk to think farther ahead than tomorrow?

Why on earth would we want job security to be a pillar of civil service. “Work for the gov! There’s no performance standard!” has been the MO for eternity and resulted in disgusting bloat. Being better, more efficient, and less costly is actively disincentivized. The fed is best portrayed as the guy from Office Space working out of a basement storage room endlessly looking for his stapler.

Job security was about no layoffs to goose executive bonuses or fired for ageism.

Holding to performance standards would have no problems with that.

That is not what DOGE is doing.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I agree that these layoffs will fundamentally change DC. I think the layoffs will be rescinded within weeks, as lawsuits wind their way through agencies and courts. But I think the shock of Musk taking a wrecking ball to one of the pillars of civil service, job security, will be felt for years to come. He has no idea what he has done and will never know, because soon enough he'll be off to another project, leaving DC behind. Even if he is fined for some of the illegalities he has committed, he'll just pay it and then never think of federal employees again.

This is going to stain the Republican party, too. Have they figured that out yet? Or are they still too petrified of Trump/Musk to think farther ahead than tomorrow?

Why on earth would we want job security to be a pillar of civil service. “Work for the gov! There’s no performance standard!” has been the MO for eternity and resulted in disgusting bloat. Being better, more efficient, and less costly is actively disincentivized. The fed is best portrayed as the guy from Office Space working out of a basement storage room endlessly looking for his stapler.

+1000

This is all blatantly illegal. Once Congress sets up a program, the executive branch does not have the power to gut it. This is another step towards the degradation of the rule of law. These genies don't go back in bottles either. The next president, regardless of party, will think imaybe t's not such a big deal to ignore what the law says.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:At a minimum, DC needs to get serious about combatting crime. It’s just about the only thing it can control. We can’t afford to play around with restorative justice when the economy is also getting gutted.

Crime is down significantly, read up.

[Anonymous]

Don't forget, property values tank and the govt gets less money too from property taxes.

The massive hit to income and property tax is going level DMV. Well, they drained the swamp, I hope they're happy they destroyed a lot of peoples' lives.

The whole area turns into Baltimore's big brother. Maybe the area can shift to biotech, banking, and manufacturing.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:All these idiots parroting the line about bloated govt. Look at the trend here, it's basically flat and includes military employees as well. If we account for the population increase govt actually has shrunk significantly.

I don't even work for the govt just sick of hearing uneducated idiots bleating out this never-ending nonsense.

We have supercomputers in our pockets, AI, etc. and can't bother to actually engage our brains and let them be smoothed out by stupid sound bites.

The government has been bloated since FDR. That’s not an uneducated opinion. As recently as the Clinton administration it wasn’t even a partisan one.

The US Military had decreased in size pretty aggressively over the last 15 years, so the flat trend you referenced isn’t the flex you think it is.

The debt/GDP ratio is headed quickly towards a troubling or unknown point. Regardless of your economic viewpoint, it’s not a good thing. Taxes skyrocketing in the future is essentially inevitable and it won’t be the liberal dream of the 1% getting liquidated by the IRS.

While the Doge attack is hasty and mostly for clicks, a significantly smaller government, in scope and expense, is not just a Republican pipe dream, it’s an economic necessity along with an across the board increase in tax revenue.

The statist’s desire for a big government pushing partisan programming is unsustainable, just like the endless increase in unaudited military expenditure from the right.

Calling this perspective uneducated is small minded. You might disagree with the outcome of cutting gov programs aligned with your ideology, but austerity is hardly a wild take.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:All these idiots parroting the line about bloated govt. Look at the trend here, it's basically flat and includes military employees as well. If we account for the population increase govt actually has shrunk significantly.

I don't even work for the govt just sick of hearing uneducated idiots bleating out this never-ending nonsense.

We have supercomputers in our pockets, AI, etc. and can't bother to actually engage our brains and let them be smoothed out by stupid sound bites.

The government has been bloated since FDR. That’s not an uneducated opinion. As recently as the Clinton administration it wasn’t even a partisan one.

The US Military had decreased in size pretty aggressively over the last 15 years, so the flat trend you referenced isn’t the flex you think it is.

The debt/GDP ratio is headed quickly towards a troubling or unknown point. Regardless of your economic viewpoint, it’s not a good thing. Taxes skyrocketing in the future is essentially inevitable and it won’t be the liberal dream of the 1% getting liquidated by the IRS.

While the Doge attack is hasty and mostly for clicks, a significantly smaller government, in scope and expense, is not just a Republican pipe dream, it’s an economic necessity along with an across the board increase in tax revenue.

The statist’s desire for a big government pushing partisan programming is unsustainable, just like the endless increase in unaudited military expenditure from the right.

Calling this perspective uneducated is small minded. You might disagree with the outcome of cutting gov programs aligned with your ideology, but austerity is hardly a wild take.

The biggest reasons for massive US debt are Medicare and Medicaid with the military in close 3rd.

Medicare and Medicaid are killing the country because the US are a bunch of dumbasses who constantly keep voting for the same garbage healthcare system that never changes. If Americans weren't so stupid, they'd fix the fundamental root of the problem, which is America's asinine for profit healthcare system.

You could fire every single federal worker and save what, 5% of the budget?

And I honestly don't care if the federal govt is a jobs program. That's far better than having tons of unemployed people with nothing to do who get restless. Government workers end up paying income taxes anyway, so it's not like they're that expensive. They also spend all of their income in the economy to purchase goods and services from local businesses. Contrast that to wasting hundreds of billions of dollars because of US' stupid healthcare system, and all of the money goes to some giant corporate entity who uses all of that money for stock buybacks.