Elon Musk is hiring for his DOGE taskforce—but the work is an unglamorous grind

Nicknamed DOGE after the cryptocurrency preferred by the Tesla CEO, its stated purpose is to radically shrink the size of the federal government by streamlining bureaucracy, eliminating jobs and shaving up to a third off of the $6.75 trillion fiscal budget. 

Only the smartest Americans most ideologically dedicated to this cause should consider polishing up their resumés, however, because the task will prove gruelling and thankless, according to DOGE, which will be run jointly by Musk and fellow entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy.

“We need super high-IQ, small-government revolutionaries willing to work 80+ hours per week on unglamorous cost-cutting,” DOGE said in a statement on Thursday posted from its official account.

Interested parties looking to throw their hat in the ring must message DOGE directly, which already bears the grey check X introduced to signify a government body. Doing so is not free, however—it involves first paying Musk an X subscription fee for the privilege and so far the account is exclusive to his social media platform. 

Outstanding candidates who meet the criteria will be selected personally by Musk and his partner, it promised: “Elon & Vivek will review the top 1% of applicants.”

Dismantling the ‘Administrative State’

Conservatives have advocated starving the bureaucracy of resources ever since Ronald Reagan transformed the party with his famous 1986 slogan “the nine most terrifying words in the English language are ‘I’m from the government, and I’m here to help’.”

Instead of creating a level-playing field for the market, the state has become synonymous among conservatives and libertarians with an ever-hungry leviathan that expands by feeding on the sovereignty of the individual (U.S. government spending as a share of the economy is however comparatively low versus other industrialized states).

“Republican politicians have dreamed about the objectives of ‘DOGE’ for a very long time,” Trump said in a statement this week.

Project 2025, the policy blueprint authored by right-wing think tank Heritage Foundation for a potential Republican-controlled White House, targeted this so-called Administrative State, “the dismantling of which must be a top priority for the next…