What Elon Musk didn’t budget for: Firing workers costs money, too

President Donald Trump and Elon Musk promised taxpayers big savings, maybe even a “DOGE dividend” check in their mailboxes, when the Department of Government Efficiency was let loose on the federal government. Now, as he prepares to step back from his presidential assignment to cut bureaucratic fat, Musk has said without providing details that DOGE is likely to save taxpayers only $150 billion. That is about 15% of the $1 trillion he pledged to save, less than 8% of the $2 trillion in savings he had originally promised and a fraction of the nearly $7…