Source: Cato Institute
by Ryan Bourne
“Matt Yglesias makes a point that we will hear a lot from Democrats in the coming months. Progressives will claim that because DOGE ‘failed’ to live up to its ambitions to slash government spending by trillions, there must be little government waste. Indeed, economist Alan Blinder even says that Elon Musk should examine Social Security as a model of efficiency, given its administration costs only 0.5 percent of benefits paid out. Hmm. DOGE’s ambition to cut trillions in annual spending was always wildly overambitious without the support of Congress and with DOGE’s limited focus on federal employees, grants, software, and eradicating waste and fraud. Clearly, DOGE had other goals beyond its spending ambitions anyway. But does DOGE’s smaller estimated savings of $165 billion (many think it’s lower still) really show that the federal government is a paragon of efficiency and devoid of ‘waste?’ I’m sorry, but no.” (05/09/25)
https://www.cato.org/commentary/does-doge-show-theres-little-government-waste