Since early 2025, sweeping cuts by the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) have dramatically altered the lives of many federal employees and contractors. Between President Donald Trump’s second-term start on January 20, 2025, and December, more than 350,000 people left the federal payroll and the workforce contracted by about 242,000 — roughly a 10% net decline, according to the Office of Personnel Management. Affected workers describe sudden job loss, medical crises, financial strain and, for some, unexpected new careers or moves across the country. Their stories show both the human cost of rapid downsizing and how public-service jobs have shifted to state and local roles.
Key takeaways
- More than 350,000 employees left the federal payroll after January 20, 2025; after hires, the net reduction was 242,000, about 10% of civilian federal staff, leaving ~2.1 million federal civilian employees (OPM).
- DOGE-driven reductions included targeted RIFs that affected at least 10,500 workers across agencies through formal reduction-in-force actions.
- The Department of Education lost about 49% of its staff in the overhaul, while the Department of Homeland Security saw an 11% staffing dip, reflecting prioritization differences across agencies.
- Individual impacts ranged from severe medical and financial harm — e.g., Morgan Hall accrued roughly $57,000 in hospital bills after a stress-induced hospitalization — to career pivots such as teaching, municipal government roles or entrepreneurship.
- Relocation has been common: CivicMatch reported connecting nearly 190 former federal workers to state and local jobs last year, with ~33% moving to another state and ~10% making cross-country moves.
- Some displaced workers accepted deferred resignation buyouts or temporary contractor roles; others pursued volunteer advocacy (e.g., Aid on the Hill) or took low-paid part-time work to bridge income gaps.
Background
In January 2025, after President Trump returned to the White House, DOGE — a reorganized entity rooted in the US Digital Service and led by entrepreneur Elon Musk — initiated a rapid downsizing and reorganization of the federal civilian workforce. The effort included hiring freezes, broad buyout offers, and large-scale reductions-in-force (RIFs). Federal leadership framed the moves as a cost-cutting and efficiency exercise intended to reduce the deficit and refocus the civil service.
Opponents warned the cuts would reduce institutional capacity in public health, education and international aid; proponents argued they would eliminate bureaucracy and reallocate work to higher-priority functions. The Office of Personnel Management’s payroll tallies through December 2025 capture the scale of the shift: more than 350,000 departures and a net workforce shrink of about 242,000, leaving roughly 2.1 million civilian federal employees. Agencies deemed high priority — such as DHS — were relatively insulated, while others saw dramatic staff reductions.
Main event
Ashley Garley, a former malaria specialist contractor at USAID, lost her position after the U.S. froze foreign aid in late January 2025 and has since struggled to replace a full-time job with benefits. Garley returned to work she held as a young adult — teaching swim lessons at a county pool in Maryland — describing the shift from global assignments to a local part-time role as “pretty emotional.” Her case is one among hundreds of thousands affected by the DOGE downsizing.
Morgan Hall, an analyst in CDC’s violence prevention division, was placed on administrative leave on February 14, 2025, later terminated in a RIF and hospitalized for 10 days in October after severe depression and stress-related complications; she reports about $57,000 in medical bills and temporary reliance on food stamps and relatives for housing assistance. Hall took a short-term 12-week contractor placement back at CDC in January but remains financially strained and continues an active job search.
Other displaced workers recount varied paths. Casey Hollowell, an Army veteran and former USDA investigative analyst, accepted a deferred resignation buyout in April, saw his federal pay stop at the end of September, and after almost a year of searching he started a private-sector data-analyst job on February 2, 2026; the experience prompted him to change his political registration to independent. Kit Rees left DOJ’s Civil Rights Division in September after taking a buyout, worked retail and restoration jobs to cope, took out a $15,000 loan, and recently accepted a field job with a pay cut of more than $30,000.
Some former employees used the break to retrain or reorient. Steve Leibman, formerly at the US Digital Service in Boston, did consulting and climbed Mount Kilimanjaro before enrolling in a one-year teacher licensing program at Harvard to pursue high-school math teaching. Others moved geographically: Nathan Karrel relocated from Washington, DC, to Tucson and took a city job, and Lucas King moved from DC back to Idaho to work in local permitting and inspections. For many, the upheaval has meant shifting public-service skills into municipal or state roles.
Analysis & implications
The workforce contraction carries immediate operational and long-term institutional consequences. Cuts at scale reduce on-the-ground capacity in public health, education oversight and foreign assistance while shifting many responsibilities to state and local governments or contractor networks. Agencies that lost large shares of staff — for example, the Department of Education with a roughly 49% reduction — may face backlogs, slower enforcement or diminished subject-matter expertise for months or years.
Financially, displaced workers are experiencing varied economic outcomes: some land higher-paying private-sector roles, but many face income loss, depleted savings and medical debt; Morgan Hall’s $57,000 hospital bill is a stark example of how employment shocks translate into healthcare and housing vulnerability. The loss of benefits such as employer-sponsored health insurance compounds risk, particularly for workers with preexisting conditions or caregiving responsibilities.
There are civic and geographic spillovers. Platforms like CivicMatch and local governments have absorbed some talent, turning federal retrenchment into a labor redistribution that can benefit municipalities and states. Yet this migration also fractures institutional memory and can amplify regional inequities: communities with concentrated federal employment may lose middle-income households and specialized skills, while receiving local governments gain experienced staff with federal know-how.
Politically and culturally, the cuts are reshaping career trajectories and civic engagement. Several former employees have turned to advocacy or volunteer organizing — for instance, Aid on the Hill and Crisis in Care — which may sustain programmatic priorities outside federal payrolls but also rely heavily on unpaid labor and philanthropy. The mix of personal hardship and adaptive responses suggests both human cost and potential reinvention, but long-term public-service capacity questions remain unresolved.
Comparison & data
| Metric | Value / Detail |
|---|---|
| Payroll departures since Jan 20, 2025 | More than 350,000 (OPM) |
| Net workforce change (Jan 20–Dec 2025) | -242,000 (≈10% decrease), ~2.1 million remain (OPM) |
| Department of Education staffing change | ~49% reduction (OPM) |
| Department of Homeland Security staffing change | ~11% reduction (OPM) |
| RIF-affected employees | ~10,500 impacted by reduction-in-force actions |
| CivicMatch placements | Nearly 190 former federal workers connected; ~33% moved states, ~10% cross-country |
The table synthesizes official payroll figures and reported placement outcomes to highlight scale and destination trends. The differential impacts across agencies reflect political prioritization: mission-critical or high-priority agencies sustained smaller reductions, while others experienced deep staff losses. Labor redistribution to states and cities is measurable but does not fully substitute federal institutional expertise, particularly for technical or international roles.
Reactions & quotes
Former employees and advocates emphasized personal loss alongside determination to continue public-purpose work. Many described disrupted careers and the financial strain of sudden unemployment.
“It’s been pretty emotional,”
Ashley Garley, former USAID malaria contractor
Garley’s comment summarized the abrupt shift from international public-health work to local part-time employment that many experienced. Others focused on the financial and mental-health consequences of abrupt separation from federal roles.
“My hope and prayer is that one day I can go back and continue to complete my mission at CDC,”
Morgan Hall, former CDC violence prevention analyst
Hall’s statement underscores the combination of professional identity loss and ongoing financial strain after hospitalization and medical bills. CivicMatch and municipal employers described a separate perspective: an urgent need to hire experienced public servants as federal jobs contracted.
“As the federal government retrenches, the work obviously does not disappear. It shifts to cities and states,”
Caitlin Lewis, founder, CivicMatch (jobs platform)
Lewis framed the downsizing as a talent redistribution engine that benefits local governments while highlighting broader systemic shifts in where public services are delivered.
Unconfirmed
- President Trump’s claim that displaced federal workers are “now making more money” in the private sector has not been substantiated with broad, verifiable earnings data covering the full cohort.
- Long-term effects on program outcomes (e.g., education oversight or global health project completion rates) are not yet fully measured and will require agency reporting and longitudinal studies.
Bottom line
The DOGE-driven downsizing since January 20, 2025, has produced a complex mix of hardship and adaptation among former federal workers: severe medical bills and housing stress for some, retraining or new careers for others, and significant geographic redistribution of public-service talent. Official payroll data make clear the scale — over 350,000 departures and a net workforce decline of about 242,000 through December 2025 — but the human stories reveal consequences that payroll numbers alone cannot capture.
Policy implications are immediate: reduced federal staffing risks capacity gaps in public health, education oversight and international aid, while state and local governments absorb talent unevenly. For displaced workers, short-term relief often depends on temporary jobs, family support and private-sector hiring, but the longer-term rebuilding of public-sector expertise will require deliberate rehiring, training investments and attention to health and financial recovery for those harmed by rapid cuts.