alt Hacker NewsAnother very negative long-term effect of all of this is how is the government going to recruit talent in the future? How many people, who have good prospects elsewhere, are going to work for a government agency -- usually a lower pay -- to put up with shit like this that doesn't even happen in industry? Would you? Sure there are sometimes mass layoffs that are handled pretty badly in industry, but not these Gestapo-like purge tactics that are clearly designed that way to instill fear and loyalty.
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That is the entire point. They want a government that nobody wants to work for so that regulations on cars, rocket launches, and securities will stop bothering their profits.
If not intentional, then a happy side effect.
The goal is to destroy the state apparatus from the inside, to be replaced by private industry.
Why have a functional government if instead you and your buddies can you benefit from contracting out?
We've needed reforms to civil service and the general schedule pay scale specifically for a long time now. One can hope that a future Congress could write a bill that resets government hiring and compensation practices in the wake of this administration, but perhaps that's a fantasy at this point.
First, DOGE proposes to reduce the size of the federal workforce, so the need to recruit talent may not be that great, second they might recruit from the pool of talent that supports all of this -- it might be a small pool, but if the workforce is small enough...
> How many people, who have good prospects elsewhere, are going to work for a government agency -- usually a lower pay -- to put up with shit like this that doesn't even happen in industry? Would you?
You could remove the "to put up with shit like this" part and the answer would still be "nobody". You have to remove the "who have good prospects elsewhere" part for it to make sense.
>to put up with shit like this that doesn't even happen in industry?
The C-suite never bring in hatchetmen? What world do you work in?
> Sure there are sometimes mass layoffs that are handled pretty badly in industry, but not these Gestapo-like purge tactics that are clearly designed that way to instill fear and loyalty.
Isn't the difference here that in the private sector you have to do all that loyalty shit from day one, not just whenever the board restructures and you want to keep your job?
This is basic dictatorshipping, I think US folks need to refresh skills so common in rest of the world.
You want obedient lackeys as #1 rule, it means reasonably little threat and no resistance to molding from above. Competences are sometimes even frowned upon. Look at how potus literally demands that others lick his boots to keep it polite.
This is how russians run their dictatorships for example, including those they exported elsewhere under their iron hand / military bases. Talking from first hand experience.
Of course that part of the system is very ineffective. Regardless of what you think about government and its bureaucracy, that fascist manchild aint gonna end up with success story here, he lacks (any genuine) emotional intelligence to understand underlying reasons. This isnt technical problem to solve where he sometimes excells.
> put up with shit like this that doesn't even happen in industry
Musk did a trial run with it on Twitter.
I think that is part of the point. "As hire As. Bs hire Cs." A-tier folks want to work with the best, B-tier folks want to work with lackeys that will do their bidding. It's pretty clear there's no A-tier folks in charge at the moment.