Tens of thousands of US federal employees could lose their jobs after the Trump administration moves to reduce the size of the federal workforce dramatically.
With Elon Musk at the helm of the so-called “department of government efficiency” (Doge), which is overseeing efforts to cull federal employment, the White House has embarked on multiple plans to cut down on virtually all areas of federal employment. There are no official numbers of how many federal employees will be affected, and many of Donald Trump and Musk’s efforts have been stalled in court, but the impact could be big and long-lasting.
To understand what the cuts will do to federal operations, we first have to understand who works for the federal government and what they do. Here’s what we know about the federal workforce.
How big is the federal workforce?
There are about 3 million federal employees in the US, about 2% of the entire US workforce, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS), the data division of the Department of Labor.
Much of the federal workforce falls under the executive departments, the leaders of which make up the president’s cabinet. The Department of Defense is the largest employer, as it houses the US military, which includes the army, navy and air force, and has more than 750,000 employees. This figure encompasses the civil workforce within the defense department. There’s an additional 1.3 million active-duty US military personnel that BLS does not include when counting the federal workforce.
The Department of Veterans Affairs is the next largest employer, with approximately 480,000 employees.
The number of federal workers has largely remained unchanged over the last 50 years, with exceptions every 10 years for when there’s an influx of employees working on the US Census.
What are the demographics of the federal workforce?
When compared with the overall employed workforce, federal workers skew slightly older. More than 50% of federal workers are over 45, compared with 43% of the overall workforce.
Meanwhile, the racial demographics of the federal workforce largely reflect the demographics of the country as a whole, with one key exception: the federal government has a higher percentage of Black employees than the private sector.
This is likely because the federal government implemented laws after the civil rights era to prevent bias in workplace hiring, allowing more Black workers to enter the federal workforce.
In January, Donald Trump signed two sweeping executive orders that ended diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) programs inside the federal government. He overturned multiple executive orders, including one from the civil rights era that required private contractors to practice equal employment opportunity when hiring.
While the federal layoffs are separate from Trump’s DEI actions, they both encompass dramatic efforts from the Trump administration to curtail the federal government’s role as an employer.
Where do federal workers live?
It’s a common misconception that most federal workers live in Washington DC. While federal workers make up a huge chunk of Washington’s population, the vast majority of federal workers live in other states across the country. They range from a national parks ranger in Montana to an infectious disease researcher in Georgia to a doctor working at a hospital run by the veterans affairs department. The US Department of Agriculture (USDA) alone has more than 100,000 employees across 4,500 offices nationwide.
How do federal employees compare with state and local government employees?
Federal employees make up just a small fraction of all government employees in the US. The vast majority of government workers, about 15 million, work for local governments, while nearly 6 million work for state governments.
Local governments manage police and fire departments, parks and recreation and housing services. State governments often work with local governments to help with things such as regulating highways and education.
What about federal contractors?
BLS does not consider those who work for federal contractors, or private companies that have agreements to do work for the federal government, as federal government employees. There is no official number for how many private contractors there are for the federal government, but a recent Brookings Institution analysis estimated that there were approximately 5.2 million private contractor employees in 2023.
What does the Trump administration want to do to the federal workforce?
Musk is leading the White House’s efforts to downsize the federal government, all supposedly for the sake of saving money. Musk said in October 2024 at a campaign event for Trump in New York City that he wants to cut the federal government budget by $2tn. Keep in mind that discretionary spending, or the amount that Congress has control over, was $1.7tn in 2023.
In February, Musk said from the Oval Office: “The people voted for major government reform, and that’s what the people are going to get.”
There are two main initiatives that Musk’s Doge is trying to carry out. The first is offering federal employees buyouts for voluntarily leaving their jobs, and the second is laying off probationary employees, or employees who have been in their job for less than a year and don’t have civil service protection.
It is unclear how many employees these initiatives will affect. The White House has said about 75,000 employees accepted buyouts, which will give workers a few months of pay and benefits if they leave their jobs imminently, what is known as “deferred resignation”. A federal judge temporarily blocked the program, which the Trump administration will now have to defend in court.
Meanwhile, the layoffs of probationary employees appears to have caused chaos across many parts of the federal government. The Internal Revenue Service (IRS), Department of Health and Human Services and Department of Defense all said they each had more than 5,000 employees on probation who could be laid off.
The White House said that military service members, postal service workers and those whose positions relate to national security, immigration and public safety would be exempt from the buyout and layoff programs.