Trump asks Elon Musk to cut government costs
The idea to form a government efficiency commission actually came from Musk during his conversation with the President-elect on X. The latter responded that he loved it – and now made it a reality.
Musk will likely use the platform down the road to keep us updated on the dealings of D.O.G.E., saying that the office would post all of its actions on social media for transparency. “We will also have a leaderboard for most insanely dumb spending of your tax dollars,” Musk said in the post. “This will be both extremely tragic and extremely entertaining.”
Musk previously said that he could slash government spending by as much as 2 trillion dollars. However, experts seem to disagree. CNN quotes Glenn Hubbard, an economist and former dean of Columbia University’s Business School, as saying that it is “mathematically impossible,” while former Treasury Secretary Larry Summers argues that the Tesla CEO “would be lucky to $200 billion in federal budget cuts.”
It is also important to note that the new ‘Department of Government Efficiency’ will not be an official government department. Trump said it would “provide advice and guidance from outside of Government.”
Musk heavily backed Trump during his re-election campaign. It remains to be seen what his re-election means for the electric car industry and what role his relationship with Musk could play. After all, Republicans have largely condemned electric cars, and Trump will likely roll back vehicle emission standards under the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), as well as incentives for EVs. He already said that he wants to abolish the tax credit issued to US consumers when buying an electric vehicle.
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