Bill Clinton Fired 377,000 Government Workers in early 1990s

@wildgrass said
Great comparison. They spent six months reviewing the agencies carefully, made hundreds of recommendations to agency leaders, there was robust debate in Congress and many compromised, they focused on military contractors getting paid too much, and the job cuts occurred over a 6 year time frame designed to minimize impact on the economy and military readiness.

This is a g ...[text shortened]... vernment that is completely and utterly ignored at every level by the incoming trump administration.

@spruce112358 said
Exactly. 😆

The dictator will do one thing, then another thing, then another ...

And eventually kills all the Jews. It always ends with that. 😆

@Metal-Brain said
So you want to destroy Russia?

https://rumble.com/v6nuw5x-dems-freak-out-over-possible-peace-in-ukraine.html?e9s=src_v1_ucp

No peace until Russia is destroyed even though Russia is winning the war?
Newsflash: Ukraine is losing the war badly.

@spruce112358 said
Putin should have been gone in 2014. 😆

I’ve got nothing against Russia. I like Russians.

@Metal-Brain said
No peace until Russia is destroyed even though Russia is winning the war?
Newsflash: Ukraine is losing the war badly.

Democrats unwittingly support Ukraine losing more territory to Russia. They have themselves fooled into thinking Ukraine has a chance.

@spruce112358 said
Jeez, literally everything you say is wrong. 😆

Russia will never conquer Ukraine, but Putin finds being at war useful in maintaining his own power in Russia.

Russia isn't going to be destroyed, Russia is not winning the war, and Ukraine is not losing the war.

Just for historical comparison - it took Hitler 4 months to conquer Ukraine. Russia has been fighting Ukraine for ELEVEN YEARS and still is nowhere close to conquering the country. 😆

@AverageJoe1 Clinton, a Democrat, left us with ZERO debt. The GOP has driven up the national debt whenever they are in charge. Yes, Clinton cut back the bureaucracy in an appropriate manner. Here's the article from your link.

According to testimony from Elaine Karmarck, the director of Clinton's initiative, it eliminated 426,200 federal roles between January 1993 and September 2000.
Looking back on the 1990s, it's strange to imagine a time when a presidential campaign was won on a promise to balance the federal budget. Bill Clinton did it, too — the U.S. federal budget had a surplus between 1998 and 2001, the only time there's been a surplus since 1970. (The government's debt is $36.22 trillion at the time of writing).

In January and February 2025, U.S. President Donald Trump began giving Elon Musk's Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) increasing control over government services in an effort to eliminate federal government programs and dramatically slash spending.

Some media outlets claimed Trump and Musk's methodology was unprecedented. In response, social media posts appeared pointing back to a Clinton-era initiative that "oversaw the termination of 377,000 federal employees," as evidence that Trump and Musk had simply "learned from the master."

It's true that during his presidency, Clinton reduced the federal government's workforce by more than 377,000 employees as part of an initiative called the National Partnership for Reinventing Government (initially called the National Performance Review, or NPR). However, there's a key difference between how Clinton's NPR cut jobs and what Trump and Musk are trying.

In March 1993, just two months into his presidency, Clinton announced the creation of the National Performance Review, led by his Vice President, Al Gore. Its goal, according to Clinton's announcement, was "to make the entire Federal Government both less expensive and more efficient, and to change the culture of our national bureaucracy away from complacency and entitlement toward initiative and empowerment."

The review lasted six months, and made 384 recommendations to improve the federal bureaucracy. The implementation of those policies took a lot longer, and some required legislation to be passed through Congress. For instance, in 1994, Clinton signed a bill that offered federal workers buyouts of up to $25,000 in an effort to reduce the workforce by 272,000 employees. According to an April 1995 statement from Clinton, the buyouts were largely offered to management positions in an effort to "reduce the layers of bureaucracy and micromanagement that were tying Government in knots." That statement said that about 70 of the buyouts in non-Department of Defense agencies went to managers and other individuals "at higher grade levels."

The initiative continued to make recommendations for government reform. According to a 1999 article on an archived version of NPR's website, it reduced the federal workforce by 351,000 between 1993 and 1998. An archived FAQ page from 2000 said 377,000 jobs were cut between 1993 and 1999. In a 2013 appearance before the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, former National Performance Review leader Elaine Karmarck said the agency cut 426,200 jobs by September 2000.

But the buyouts offered by Clinton's NPR and Trump and Musk's Department of Government Efficiency are not the same. Clinton's buyout plan had overwhelming bipartisan support from Congress, and the law was signed after a review period. Meanwhile, Trump and Musk offered the buyouts just one week into Trump's term, with no review process.

Federal employee labor unions have sued, questioning the legality of the buyout, and a federal judge has temporarily blocked the offer in order to review the lawsuit.

Sources:
Brief History of the National Partnership for Reinventing Government. https://govinfo.library.unt.edu/npr/whoweare/history2.html. Accessed 7 Feb. 2025.

@spruce112358 said
Putin should have been gone in 2014. 😆

I’ve got nothing against Russia. I like Russians.

@Phranny said
@AverageJoe1 Clinton, a Democrat, left us with ZERO debt. The GOP has driven up the national debt whenever they are in charge. Yes, Clinton cut back the bureaucracy in an appropriate manner. Here's the article from your link.

According to testimony from Elaine Karmarck, the director of Clinton's initiative, it eliminated 426,200 federal roles between January 1993 and Sept ...[text shortened]... enting Government. https://govinfo.library.unt.edu/npr/whoweare/history2.html. Accessed 7 Feb. 2025.

@Metal-Brain said
What a coincidence. 2014 is when the US backed a coup to overthrow the Ukraine government.

https://www.wsws.org/en/topics/event/2014-coup-ukraine

Assistant Secretary of State for European Affairs Victoria Nuland pushed for the Ukraine coup and helped pick the post-coup leaders.

https://truthout.org/articles/the-ukraine-mess-that-nuland-made/

@AverageJoe1 Trump is trying to destroy our democracy, install himself as king and grab other countries and land across the planet. Donald Duck and Muskrat are taking a chainsaw to agencies. They are not looking for fraud or waste, They are just destroying the government.

Phranny, remember "never argue with a fool" and don't get infected by the Trusk rabies carriers. You're one of a few American posters here that I respect.

@Metal-Brain said
Are you claiming Trump and Musk are not cutting "carefully"?
It looks like you are defending cuts if they are well thought out.

Are Musk and Trump flipping a coin to decide who to cut? LOL!

@AverageJoe1 said
To me, it is very simple. You can rail on about Clinton,, ,or Obama, and all that 'went on'. But you have never had he talent at the head of govt that you do now. It is a new age and there has been waste, abuse and fraud. Trump wants to stop it. He and his 'unelected' cabinet, and unelected just about everyone, are trhying to make us better again.
Does anyone deny ...[text shortened]... , not OK. And you want us to compare the two and decide to be like you and Sonhouse. Yeah, right.

@Metal-Brain said
What a coincidence. 2014 is when the US backed a coup to overthrow the Ukraine government.

https://www.wsws.org/en/topics/event/2014-coup-ukraine

Assistant Secretary of State for European Affairs Victoria Nuland pushed for the Ukraine coup and helped pick the post-coup leaders.

https://truthout.org/articles/the-ukraine-mess-that-nuland-made/