Elon Musk Jokes That DOGE Has a 120-Hour Workweek, Shifting Focus from Narayana Murthy

Very few in the bureaucracy actually work the weekend so it's kind of like when the opposing team just leaves for 2 days!" he remarked in another posting on X in which he identified working weekends as a "superpower".

Tesla and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk said the Department of Government Efficiency employees work 120 hours in a week, drawing flak on social media.

Very few in the bureaucracy actually work the weekend so it's kind of like when the opposing team just leaves for 2 days!" he remarked in another posting on X in which he identified working weekends as a "superpower".

Advertisement

This, he reasoned, is simply because bureaucratic foes are "gaining so much fat" that they work but 40 hours a week.

There were diverse reactions to this post, and while one simply described him as a "worst boss," another condemned the DOGE site as "desolate" whereas his employees must have put 120 hours for one week. Another user put down some figures that showed that of the employees take two days off in a week, they work 24 hours on all other days, "So. Doge in made up of aliens and robots and Elon! Or, Elon says anything to make himself look better," a user wrote on X.

Advertisement

Another user simply stated that hours of work are not always successful. "It's the quality of those hours, the impact of decisions, and strategic thinking that ultimately determines who wins," the user said.

Many praised the DOGE work culture, noting that the department and Mr Musk are "heroes in the fight against the swamp". The user equated Mr Musk with Napoleon, noting that he has "genius intellect, dragon energy and prodigious work ethic".

Advertisement

Mr Musk, who was picked by Trump to run DOGE, said that the department aims at "the root out of inefficiency and corruption in government." It is scheduled to implement Trump's vision of a smaller, more efficient government by July 4 next year, the 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence.

Soon after the US election results became clearer, Mr Musk had invited applications for DOGE. He had said that he is looking for "super high-IQ small-government revolutionaries" willing to work over 80 hours a week on unglamorous cost-cutting tasks.

Advertisement

Mr Musk's comment on the number of hours or work in a week comes after a row over comments by L&T chairman SN Subrahmanyan and Infosys co-founder Narayana Murthy. Strong backlash followed Subrahmanyan's suggestion to employees to work 90 hours a week, while Murthy's call for a 70-hour work week had also sparked a massive row.

Read also| Allegations of Foreign Nations Orchestrating Assassinations of Americans a Grave Concern: Tulsi Gabbard

Read also| Yati Narsinghanand Urges PM Modi to Take Military Action for Hindu Protection in Bangladesh and Pakistan

Advertisement

Advertisement