Why President Trump's buyout plan is predicted to fail

President Donald Trump's directives to shrink the federal workforce by next week seeks to make good on his campaign pledge to root out federal workers who aren't loyal to him and remake the government in his own image.

The reality to get government workers to agree to buyouts is more complicated and could have effects that reverberate far beyond the nation's capital.

The federal government is a massive, sprawling bureaucracy with nearly 2.3 million civilian employees and a presence in all 50 states. Its programs touch everything from water cleanliness to air travel safety to lunch programs in elementary schools.

The White House expects 10% of government employees to take the offer to resign their posts by Feb. 6 and keep their paychecks and benefits through the end of September. But data indicate that many workers may not consider that a good deal, and will be incentivized to stay because of their pensions and other benefits.

Federal positions are also synonymous with job stability and come with good benefits and a pension — perks that will likely last far longer than Trump's four years in office. Average salaries are nearly $106,400, well above the average nationwide pay of roughly $64,000.

The Trump administration has sought to cast doubt on the longevity of federal work, suggesting that more cuts could come for those who opt to not take the buyout offer.

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Pushing federal workers to the exit mimics a move Trump adviser Elon Musk made when he took over the social media platform then known as Twitter. The billionaire — now in charge of the White House's federal efficiency efforts — culled his company's workforce from roughly 8,000 down to about 1,500, a massive reduction that's unlikely to be replicated to scale in the public sector.

The Office of Personnel Management said it didn't yet have any data on employees who had accepted or expressed interest in the offer.

Many of the largest portions of the federal workforce — namely those connected to the military — aren't even eligible to leave. The order specifically exempts jobs connected to the armed forces, postal service, national security and border enforcement. It also leaves a caveat for agencies to designate specific jobs as ineligible for the buyout program

More than four in 10 full-time permanent federal employees are age 50 and older, according to March 2024 data from the Office of Personnel Management. And more than 150,000 employees have worked for the government for 30 years or more.

Despite a workforce that is older on average than in the private sector, workers aren't retiring in large numbers. An average of 62,000 federal workers have retired each year over the past decade, according to data provided by the U.S. Office of Personnel Management. 

But the number of federal employees who become eligible to retire early is far higher, dwarfing the projected exits. Within just two years, some 298,000 federal workers will become retirement eligible, almost three times the number of workers projected to leave. 

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By 2029, the retirement-eligible workforce will balloon to more than 606,000 federal employees. The Trump administration could pressure thousands of these eligible federal workers to take an early exit, potentially turbo-charging efforts to reshape the federal workforce.

There are reasons why workers might want to stay on despite the incentives that come with early retirement offers. Federal pensions are based on the number of years of service and salary level. Leaving the government sooner than planned could mean missing out on higher-earning years, which would bring the pension value down.

Trump and Musk have also said remote work is an impetus for the buyout offers. The president has excoriated the prevalence of work-from-home throughout federal agencies. Data from the Office of Management and Budget show that about 10% of the workforce is permanently remote — including disabled workers with a documented accommodation, military spouses and those where the nature of the work is mobile. 

Federal telework guidelines long predate the national emergency that Trump declared in March 2020 during the COVID-19 pandemic. Under the Telework Enhancement Act of 2010, agencies were required to adopt remote work policies that encouraged many employees to work from home.

Musk and Trump have also said they want to cull the federal workforce because it's grown too bloated. U.S. government employment has fallen considerably over the past few decades. It currently only represents about 1.5% of overall jobs in America.