A 'Fork in the Road' for federal employees

0:01NPR.

0:11This is The Indicator from Planet Money. I'm Darian Woods. I'm Whelan Wong, and it is Jobs Friday. The latest numbers from the Bureau of Labor Statistics show that the economy added 143 ,000 jobs in January. The unemployment rate nudged down a tiny bit from December to 4%. Since President Trump took office, there is one group of workers whose job security has been in the spotlight, and that is the federal workforce. This is a huge and varied group that includes diplomats, nurses, doctors, custodians, even zoologists. As of January, there were about 3 million people employed by the federal government.

0:50The Trump administration wants this number to be a lot smaller. And Elon Musk is leading an unprecedented charge to dramatically shrink the federal workforce, sometimes through brute force actions like basically dismantling entire agencies. The government also extended an offer for employees to quit their jobs. Per the terms of the agreement, they'll be able to collect their pay and benefits through September without working. But is this offer even legal? Just yesterday, a federal judge paused the offer until at least Monday of next week. Today on the show, an employment lawyer walks us through the government's deal, which has plunged the federal workforce into confusion and uncertainty.

1:32And we talked to some of those government employees about how they've been weighing this critical decision to stay or go.

2:02Service teams more efficient, businesses run better, and your customers happier. That's the Zendesk AI effect. Find out more at Zendesk.com.

2:14The first email arrived last week from the Office of Personnel Management. It was entitled Fork in the Road, and it warned that most agencies were likely to be downsized. The office said a more streamlined federal workforce is part of a broader goal of higher performance. This echoes criticisms of the government that it can be bloated and inefficient. The email went on to offer federal employees a deal. You can tender your resignation effective in September. Workers would keep earning their salary and benefits until their resignation date. But it also said that agencies could eliminate or reassign positions in the meantime.

2:51The Fork in the Road memo went out to about 2 million employees. That's a majority of the federal workforce. One of those employees works at the National Park Service as a museum curator. She asked that we not use her name to protect her job security. In my 15 years, I've never seen anything like it. It was clear that the people at the top were showing us they really wished we would leave. Shortly after, the Office of Personnel Management published an FAQ. It said employees who resign are not expected to work between now and September, that they could take a vacation. The FAQ also encouraged workers to find a job outside of the government while implying that private sector jobs are more productive than public ones.

3:37It mentioned how we could take a job in the private sector or how we could go on a long vacation. You know, it's just like, how do you think, do you think we're just doing this for fun? Like, I have a family to support, you know. So it almost seemed like it was written by AI or someone just completely out of touch with what we're doing. The Fork in the Road email shared similarities with the memo that Twitter employees received in 2022 after Elon Musk took over. It even used the title Fork in the Road. Federal employees could accept the government offer by sending an email with the word resign in the subject line.

4:17This is one of many unusual parts of this deal. That's according to Ricardo Pitts-Wiley. He's a partner at a Washington, D.C. law firm called Federal Practice Group, and he specializes in federal employment law. I just had a litany of questions about whether the administration was authorized to provide this kind of offer. I was concerned about whether it could be legally implemented. There is no precedent for this kind of offer. We're going to talk about two of Ricardo's litany of questions. Number one, where is the money for paying out wages and benefits going to come from? The president has the authority to direct the federal government agencies, but it is Congress that pays these individuals.

5:09And right now, most of these federal agencies are only funded through mid-March. That's when the current funding bill for the government expires. The Office of Personnel Management does acknowledge this deadline. It says that if there's a lapse in congressional appropriations, employees that resign will receive back pay when that lapse is over. It is worth mentioning, though, that some federal agencies have sent out their own terms that seem different than what the Office of Personnel Management is saying. This has added to the confusion for workers. Now, the second of Ricardo's concerns is how long can federal employees be placed under administrative leave?

5:46That would be their status if they accepted the offer to quit. Ricardo says that under an existing law, leave is capped at 10 days unless there is a specific reason. And he's not sure what's laid out in the offer counts as an accepted reason. So there's concern that paying individuals to be in a paid administrative lease status beyond 10 days is unauthorized and illegal. The Office of Personnel Management, for its part, says regulations can be interpreted to allow this kind of extended administrative leave. Still, Ricardo is among a chorus of employment attorneys, not to mention federal worker unions, who are questioning whether the offer can be trusted.

6:27There's also the cautionary tale of Twitter, the last organization to get Elon Musk's fork-in-the-road memo. The company, now known as X, is reportedly facing lawsuits from thousands of former employees who say that, among other things, they didn't get the severance package they were promised. These last couple of weeks have been confusing and anxious for the federal workers we talked to, like this paralegal from the Department of Justice. She asked that we not use her name to protect her job security. The first day I was in the office after the offer, the tone was very much like, we're not taking this.

7:03It seems shady. It seems weird. And then later that afternoon, my supervisor pulled me aside and was like, hey, you should really consider taking this deal because I'm worried that you might be on a list. This paralegal is still probationary, and the Office of Personal Management recently ordered department heads to provide a list of all their probationary employees. They were also asked to, quote, promptly determine whether those employees should keep their jobs. The Department of Justice employee told us if she quits, she'll be giving up eight months of valuable work experience, plus a potential pay bump if she successfully completes her probationary period.

7:41But if she stays, she might get cut anyway and leave with nothing. She's been agonizing over the decision with a colleague in a similar situation. So the last couple of days, like, you know, thinking about our future and making some hard decisions. So I don't know any, yeah, it's been like over the course of a few days, it's been like really insane. The other employee we talked to, the museum curator at the National Park Service, said she never considered quitting. I love my job. I'm completely devoted to being a public servant in the National Park Service. And I'm going to keep telling the stories and doing the work, you know, that I believe in until I can't do it anymore.

8:26The same employee told us that if her agency loses a lot of people, it might not have enough workers to administer payroll or clean the visitor center at the national park. Like we mentioned earlier, federal employees are custodians, and they're also the people who make sure you get your tax refund. Critics worry that a hatchet versus scalpel approach to the government workforce will have consequences. Ricardo says in his experience, the vast majority of federal employees are dedicated to their mission. A sad but possible byproduct of the Trump administration's designs to thin out the federal workforce is that people may begin to understand firsthand what happens when you gut the federal government.

9:17The federal judge who paused the buyout program is scheduled to hear arguments next week. Meanwhile, a separate but similar resignation offer has gone out to employees at the CIA.

9:31This episode was produced by Angel Correras with engineering by Robert Rodriguez and Neil Thievault. It was fact-checked by Sierra Juarez. Kicking Cannon is our show's editor and The Indicator is a production of NPR.