Taylor’s Takes: Dear soon-to-be-ex-government workers…

Dear Soon-To-Be-Ex-Government Workers,

You certainly have got a lot of nerve, making a fuss the way you’ve been.

After receiving an email over the weekend asking to convey what you’ve accomplished over the past week, the overwhelming response from you has been less than satisfactory, to say the least.

You were asked to give a brief overview of five tasks you have accomplished within the last week. Instead of simply responding to Elon Musk, the person tasked with weeding out waste, fraud, and abuse at the federal level, you threw a temper tantrum. Hardly the reaction one would expect from a model government employee concerned with retaining their gainful employment.

I bet you really had it made when you first sat down in your new government digs. That was the top, right? The age-old advice passed down from many a father to their child was this: “Get a government job and you’ll be set for life.”

And what sage advice that was. A job at the federal level meant job security. Government never disbanded positions. It only added. You were never in fear of getting the pink slip.

And don’t forget the perks of a cushy government job. A pension. Write-offs by the score. Benefits. “Do you know who I am” status. Perhaps a government vehicle? Nice.

The Covid perks were unexpected bonuses, I’m sure. You got to work from home most, if not all of the week. No supervisor breathing down your neck (as if there ever was one). No need to ensure your work was on time or even done at all. Some other faceless hack would pick up the slack. If not… Oh well! Just another day of blissful bureaucracy.

You never had to worry about taking a pay cut for the “good of the company,” so to speak. Government budgets were made for expansion. Spend all the cash, be it on bonuses, pay raises, needless office furniture upgrades. It didn’t matter. You weren’t footing the bill!

But now your world has been turned upside down, hasn’t it? One email struck fear and panic into your hearts.

The substance of that email? A simple request of you to name just five things you’ve been able to do for the people you work for: the American taxpayer. That’s all.

Your righteous indignation has been shocking.

“Who does Elon think he is?!”

“I feel so disrespected and worthless.”

“I don’t have to answer to this unelected oligarch!”

These are just some of the responses we’ve all seen floating around X and have heard in news reports.

Who do you think YOU are?

Nobody elected you. You were hired, supposedly on merit. You entered into an agreement with the United States government. You have (or perhaps had) a job you were tasked with. If you ever failed to uphold your end of that agreement, you were subject to termination.

Now, perhaps it wasn’t your fault. Maybe you were lulled into such work under once-true pretenses. Old Dad’s advice may have been sage way back when. But there’s been a change at the top. Meet the new boss, different from the old boss.

The old ways of doing things are now just that. Old. No longer will the status quo be accepted.

So if you value your job and you have a sense of self-worth and self-importance, why the hesitation to comply with Elon’s simple request?

I would think that this is the opportunity of a lifetime for you. This is your time to shine! Be the competitive go-getter you are making yourself out to be. Turn in your five accomplishments over the past week, or maybe even a few more. Quickly! While all of your coddled co-workers are busy bitching and moaning about having their work scrutinized. Be the standout employee. Make us proud.

Or is complying with Elon’s request still too much for you to bear?

If that is indeed the case, that means two things.

One: All of this consternation over having to respond to an email outlining your job performance means that this is the most difficult task you’ve had to tackle in quite some time. You’ve been much too busy enjoying trips to tropical locations, occasionally logging into your work server to show that you were at least showing up. But the thought of having to detail all that you do is so overwhelming, you can’t help but text your therapist for advice.

Or two: You can’t come up with enough bullet points. You’ve become so complacent in your needless position that you can’t rattle off enough tasks to justify your bloated salary. You’re not mad at Elon. You’re not mad at Trump. You’re mad at yourself. You’ve been forced to look yourself in the mirror and estimate your contribution to society. And you know that you come up short.

If you still refuse to respond to Elon, I must prepare you. Elon’s request is not out of the ordinary. This may come as a complete and utter shock to you, but this is how things work in Corporate America.

You see, in the dreaded private sector budgets aren’t built for automatic inflation. And anything that puts those companies close to or over-budget is questioned and scrutinized. Sometimes on an annual basis, sometimes semi-annually. But I’ve never worked anywhere where my supervisor didn’t bring me into the corner office for a review, a meeting in which I had to account for my work and justify my salary.

That’s how government is going to be run, at least for the next four years. Like a corporation that is accountable to the shareholders.

But if you’re not going to be able to stomach a professional life under new management, I’m not sure you’ll ever be able to survive.

Good luck out there!