--- title: "Elon Musk Accidentally Wasted a Vast Sum of Taxpayer Money Due to His Staggering Incompetence" description: "Elon Musk's DOGE could actually be costing the government far more than it saves — an astronomical waste of taxpayer money." date: "2025-04-25" modified: "2025-04-25" authors: - name: "Victor Tangermann" job_title: "Senior Editor" link: "https://futurism.com/authors/victor" url: "https://futurism.com/elon-musk-wasted-taxpayer-money-incompetence" categories: - "Elon Musk" - "Future Society" - "The Industrialists" tags: - "doge" - "donald trump" - "elon musk" - "white house" --- # Elon Musk Accidentally Wasted a Vast Sum of Taxpayer Money Due to His Staggering Incompetence ![Elon Musk's DOGE could actually be costing the government far more than it saves — an astronomical waste of taxpayer money.]() *\Image: MANDEL NGAN/AFP via Getty Images\* Billionaire Elon Musk's effort to rid the government of purported "waste and fraud" has been a dismal failure. With his so-called Department of Government Efficiency, the richest man in the world has done little to actually save money, cutting his ambitions from an originally promised $2 trillion in savings to a [mere $150 billion earlier this month]() — a figure that remains [highly untrustworthy](). Worse yet, Musk's DOGE could actually be *costing* the government far more than it saves — an astronomical waste of taxpayer money that's resulted in immense and needless [pain and suffering](). As the [*New York Times* reports](), [mass firing]() and then [re-hiring thousands]() of public sector workers could cost upward of $135 billion this fiscal year alone. And the Internal Revenue Service, which has lost thousands of its employees due to the cuts, is [expected to collect]() a staggering $500 billion less this year following the bloodletting, a loss that dwarfs Musk's limited savings. That's in addition to the mountain of lawsuits and appeals Musk's indiscriminate gutting of agencies has triggered. According to the *NYT*, 30 out of the roughly 200 lawsuits related to the Trump administration's agenda implicate DOGE. "Not only is Musk vastly overinflating the money he has saved, he is not accounting for the exponentially larger waste that he is creating," nonprofit Partnership for Public Service chief executive Max Stier told the newspaper. "He’s inflicted these costs on the American people, who will pay them for many years to come." Experts agree that the way Musk and DOGE went about mass-firing workers and slashing budgets was counterproductive and could've been done in a far more meaningful and effective way. "They can do all the things they are currently doing, but they can’t do them the way they’re doing them," former public service worker Jeri Buchholz, who oversaw decades of hiring and firing at federal agencies, told the *NYT*. "They can either start over and do it right, or they can be in court for forever." While it may have looked like DOGE set fire to huge swathes of the government's workforce, at least one quarter of the 100,000 workers buyouts and firings trimmed had to be rehired at full pay, per the newspaper. And firing them was a glaring mistake from the get-go. Thousands of those rehired workers were in [charge of safeguarding nuclear weapons](), [combating bird flu](), or [fighting HIV]() at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Many of them were initially put on paid leave, racking up massive taxpayer bills for no work at all. In short, it's no wonder Cabinet leaders and White House officials are growing tired of Musk's charade. As [*Rolling Stone* reported]() earlier this month, some personnel have started calling him "Crazy Uncle Elon," a reference to his unpredictable and abrasive personal behavior. Besides [dad jokes]() and [screaming matches](), Musk's bull-in-the-china-shop approach has put his baffling incompetence as a "[special government employee]()" on full display — and taxpayers will ultimately have to foot the bill for his ravagery. **More on DOGE:** *[Elon Musk's DOGE Has Been a Dismal Failure]()* ## Author I've been at Futurism since 2017, where my role has evolved to encompass design, writing, and increasingly editing. I've always been fascinated by space exploration and advanced transportation, which I've leaned into by interviewing luminaries in those fields while closely following the dimensions of policy and regulation that allow next-generation projects to succeed -- or, sometimes, to fail. I'm also keenly interested in the effects of generative AI on society, policies, and democratic institutions, as well as clean energy, physics and biology, and the vagaries of tech leadership. My work for Futurism has been cited by publications including Ars Technica, Gizmodo, PC Magazine, Jalopnik, Fox News, and the New York Post. I spent my childhood living in locations including Manila, the Philippines, and Geneva, Switzerland, attended McGill University, and now live in Toronto, Canada. Before Futurism I worked at AskMen and a small photography studio. In my free time, I'm an avid gardener, foodie, and craft beer lover, as well as a maker of artisanal hot pepper sauces. I have a magnificent dog named Freida. ### Author social links [Bluesky]()