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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsDOGE wants businesses to run government services 'as much as possible'
Mail delivery. Real estate. Foreign aid grants. The Trump administration is moving to privatize a sweeping number of government functions and assets — a long-standing Republican goal that’s being catalyzed by billionaire Elon Musk.
The slash-and-burn approach of Musk’s U.S. DOGE Service is paving the way for a new shift to the private sector, reducing the size and power of the federal bureaucracy in a real-world test of the conservative theory — a version of which is also widely popular in Silicon Valley — that companies are better than government at saving money and responding to people’s needs.
Examples are popping up across Washington and in proposals from President Donald Trump’s allies, though the plans are various stages of development and, in some cases, have already encountered resistance.
At the DOGE-allied General Services Administration, officials are quietly moving ahead with a push to sell hundreds of publicly owned buildings to private companies — which can then lease them back to the government, theoretically saving maintenance and upkeep costs for taxpayers, according to two people briefed on internal deliberations who spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss them publicly.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2025/03/30/doge-privatize-government-usps-trump/
They want to take over those services and charge us beaucoup bucks.

NameAlreadyTaken
(2,013 posts)OLDMDDEM
(2,396 posts)Repair, janitorial will be performed separately and paid separately while also paying higher rent.
NameAlreadyTaken
(2,013 posts)Turbineguy
(38,943 posts)Say something nice about trump, and we'll switch on your lights again.
kimbutgar
(24,717 posts)Government works best when the bottom line is not a profit center.
All these for profit government agencies will only increase dramatically the deficit even more.
Klarkashton
(3,241 posts)Are involved. Always.
And guess what? He wants to get the business.
Ocelot II
(124,024 posts)that whatever taxpayers supposedly save by not having the government manage these functions will be made up by having to pay the businesses to do it. You want to have your mail delivered? You'll have to open an account with the privately-owned postal service. Maybe you pay by the month or by the piece; but no money, no mail. Social Security? Maybe we'll still get our checks, but how much will be deducted in fees for some private company to "manage" it? And how is selling government buildings to private companies for leaseback going to save money? They still have to be heated, repaired and cleaned, just as always. Government entities don't have a profit motive; private businesses do.
Eugene
(64,257 posts)If DOGE privatization works like privatized prisons or veterans' services, expect the profit imperative to cause corner cutting, especially in staffing.
sakabatou
(44,472 posts)YOU CAN'T RUN A GOVERNMENT LIKE A BUSINESS!
dalton99a
(87,842 posts)Timeflyer
(3,084 posts)mymomwasright
(417 posts)People just keep letting these assholes take over and destroy.
Yo_Mama_Been_Loggin
(121,064 posts)Seems they never step out of their bubble.
DiverDave
(5,064 posts)Because that's worked so well in the past
mzmolly
(52,061 posts)Government contractors charge far more than it costs to employ civil servants.
valleyrogue
(1,950 posts)We already learned or should learn that libertarian notions didn't work in the early twentieth century. Those ideas led directly to the Great Depression.
I am sick of Eloon and his ilk.