The figures from Elon Musk’s team of outsiders represent billions in government cuts. They are also full of accounting errors, outdated data and other miscalculations.According to The New York Times, Elon Musk and his Department of Government Efficiency have claimed to save the federal government $55 billion through various cost-cutting measures. These include staff reductions, lease cancellations, and terminated contracts, which have been published on their website as a “wall of receipts.”
President Trump has been touting these savings and even suggested the idea of mailing checks to Americans as a “DOGE dividend” to reimburse them. However, a closer look at the math behind these claims reveals accounting errors, incorrect assumptions, outdated data, and other mistakes. The New York Times analyzed all the contracts listed on the website and found that while some savings have been made, the group’s accounting methods are haphazard and unreliable.
Some contracts were double- or triple-counted, while others contained errors that inflated the totals by billions of dollars. In one instance, the group claimed to have canceled an entire contract when only part of the work had been halted. Additionally, some contracts that the group claimed to have closed were actually ended under the Biden administration.
The canceled contracts listed on the website only make up a small portion of the $55 billion total that the group claims to have saved. It is not possible to independently verify this number or other totals on the site with the evidence provided. A senior White House official explained how the office made its calculations for individual contracts but did not address other concerns about the group’s accounting methods.
It is important to note that not every dollar claimed by the website as savings is necessarily a dollar that the federal government would have spent, nor can it be returned to the public. The New York Times also points out that the group’s access to sensitive government payment systems is concerning, given their track record of reckless accounting.
In conclusion, while the DOGE team may have made some savings, their accounting methods are unreliable and do not necessarily reflect actual savings for the federal government.
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