1. Evolution of Musk promised cuts to federal expenses:
- October 2024 - $2 trillion per year
- March 2025 - $1 trillion per year
- April 2025 - $150 billion per year
Independent sources put the savings around $10 billion per year (the target shrunk 200-fold!).
2. Very important example of conflict of interest AND harm to the government: independent sources expect IRS workforce cuts to <<reduce>> federal revenue by <<$198 billion over a decade>>.
3. To your direct point
- most of USAID’s money was spent through American organisations, not sent abroad directly (>80% of companies holding USAID contracts were American)
- in practice USAID ran important early-warning systems: famine warnings and perhaps even more importantly disease surveillance (ever heard of... pandemics?)
Cut the nose to spite the face.
Did Musk/DOGE cut military spending (13% of budget; Musk's sponsored admin wants to double it)? Healthcare spending (27%)? Social security (23%)?
He went after politically convenient, and even worse, personally convenient targets.
It's like that joke about looking for the wallet not where you lost it in the dark, but where the light is better...
You'd think the average well educated HN commenter wouldn't fall for such easy to sport propaganda (and also spot obvious conflicts of interest). But I guess ideology beats everything and it's more important to win against "the other team".