In the United States, Elon Musk's federal purge exploded layoffs-Liberation
Unheard of since July 2020, in the midst of an economic crisis aroused by COVVI-19 pandemic : layoffs in the United States increased by 245 % in February compared to the previous month, reaching 172,017 jobs removed, according to the Challenger reclassification firm, Gray & Christmas. This significant increase would be explained mainly by the measures taken By the alleged « Department of Government Effectiveness » (« Doge »), unofficially led by Elon Musk And charged by Donald Trump to reduce public spending.
The federal administration has indeed suffered the largest of the cuts, with 62,242 positions eliminated in February. This figure represents an extraordinary increase of 41,311 % compared to the same period last year. Seventeen government agencies are affected by these workforce reductions which mainly target employees during trial period-recently recruited for the most part, but also many career civil servants who recently took a new position.
« With the impact of the actions of the Department of Government Effectiveness (DOGE), as well as the cancellation of government contracts, the fear of commercial wars and bankruptcies, the job cuts have become soaked in February », Note Andrew Challenger, labor market expert at Challenger, Gray & Christmas. And « When massive layoffs occur, the remaining staff often experiences a feeling of uncertainty. The probability that more workers leave voluntarily is high ”, he believes.
The speed with which these deletions were carried out has caused some delicate situations. Certain agencies had to reintegrate experts licensed by mistake, such as the Ministry of Agriculture which recalled specialists in avian influenza whose expertise has proven to be essential, or that of Energy, who had mistakenly separated hundreds of people responsible for watching over the country's nuclear arsenal.
However, the private sector is not spared. The retail trade has lost nearly 39,000 jobs and the technological sector 14,554 positions. Non -profit organizations have also undergone the impact of these cuts with approximately 900 jobs removed following the reduction of federal funding.
These massive layoffs have certainly not yet been significantly translated into official employment statistics. The Ministry of Labor even recorded a drop in unemployment benefits for the week ending on March 1. Economists provide that the monthly employment report, expected on Friday, March 7, will show a creation of 160,000 jobs in February, against 143,000 in January – which would confirm a clear slowdown, without decline provided at this stage. However, the effect of dismissals ordered by the DOGE may manifest itself in the data of the next few weeks or months.
The latest wave of cuts in federal workforce struck the American ocean and atmospheric observation agency (NOAA), where around 800 employees were dismissed. These discounts affect specialists in weather, oceans and climate.
Other massive workforce reductions are already planned, Despite the multitude of legal appeals to brake them. Especially at the Ministry of Veterans Affairs, where 80,000 job cuts would be planned according to an internal note revealed this week by the American media, while the New York Times revealed Thursday that the State Department plans to close a dozen consulates by the summer, mainly in Western Europe, and is considering the abolition of many other posts abroad.
These prospects, combined with uncertainties linked to trade and immigration policies of the new Trump administration, which caused the New York Stock Exchange to fall this week, threaten to weigh heavily on the future slope of the American job market.
