Since President Trump took office, thousands of government employees have lost their jobs. On his first day in office, Trump signed an executive order reclassifying tens of thousands of government employees to probationary employees, stripping them of job protections allowing them to be dismissed at any time. The president also signed an executive order freezing the hiring of anyone to executive branch jobs.
The newly created Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), led by Elon Musk, is the driving force behind the downsizing of the government workforce. DOGE has led to the firing and laying off thousands of government employees and the buyout of 75 thousand more. Furthermore, on Feb. 22, an email was sent to all government employees, asking them to list five things they did that week, or they would be fired. This email received pushback from the heads of some government agencies; however, Musk doubled down with another email sent out on Feb. 28, again asking employees to summarize their work or be fired.
With large-scale efforts to decrease the size of the government workforce, many students should continue to be aware of this as it could affect their future job outlook.
