World’s wealthiest man invites applications for ‘tedious work’ in Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE)

Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy are requesting Americans who are “high-IQ small-government revolutionaries” and ready to work over 80 hours a week to join DOGE – at zero pay. In a Thursday X post that doubled as a job announcement and another one of Musk’s trolling efforts, the account for the newly formed department of government efficiency wrote: “We don’t need more part-time idea generators. We need super high-IQ small-government revolutionaries willing to work 80+ hours per week on unglamorous cost-cutting.”

The name of the department, which actually is not part of the federal government, harkens back to a particular meme of an expressive shiba inu dog. “If that’s you, DM this account with your CV. Elon & Vivek will review the top 1% of applicants,” the statement added. In a different post, Musk chimed in on the job announcement, saying: “Indeed, this will be tedious work, make lots of enemies & compensation is zero.”

“What a great deal!” Musk, the wealthiest man in the world, wrote with a laughing emoji. He has promised to diminish federal bureaucracy by a third and cut $2tn from US government expenditure, an effort he said “necessarily involves some temporary hardship”.

Earlier this week, president elect Donald Trump announced the appointment of Musk and Ramaswamy to Doge, stating: “Together, these two wonderful Americans will pave the way for my administration to dismantle government bureaucracy, slash excess regulations, cut wasteful expenditures, and restructure federal agencies – essential to the ‘Save America’ movement.”

Trump went on to term the newly formed department as the “‘Manhattan Project’ of our time,” referring to the US-led research program during WW – II that sought to create the nuclear bomb, which slew an estimated 214,000 people in Japan in 1945.

Since the first assassination attempt against the president elect in July, Musk has emerged as one of his staunchest associates, at one point declaring himself to be “dark Maga” during the campaign. He donated $120m to Trump’s campaign, held rallies for him in the swing state of Pennsylvania and promoted Trump’s message persistently on X.

Following Trump’s re-election triumph, Musk posted an edited photo of himself carrying a sink in the Oval Office, writing: “Let that sink in.” The image harks back to Musk’s P.R. stunt from October 2022, soon after he closed his $44bn deal of buying X, formerly known as Twitter. Musk walked into the company’s headquarters carrying a sink. According to a new Fidelity approximation, X is worth almost 80% less than when Musk bought it two years ago.