Posted on Monday, March 31, 2025

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by Ben Solis

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The Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) has taken Washington D.C. by storm, dominating the news cycle and discussions on Capitol Hill. But the impact of President Donald Trump’s waste-cutting initiative may soon be felt internationally as well.

Reducing the size and power of government bureaucracies has become an increasingly popular trend among global conservatives in recent years, a phenomenon perhaps most colorfully displayed by Argentine President Javier Milei. During his captivating run for office in 2023, Milei famously used a chainsaw as a metaphor for what he planned to do to his country’s bloated bureaucracy.

But while Milei became an internet sensation and invigorated conservatives, it is Trump’s war on “waste, fraud, and abuse” that is leading the way. As chaotic as American politics has been in recent years, the free world still looks to the United States as a model for what is possible – and Trump is proving that a more lean and efficient government can better serve the needs of the people while preserving liberty and constitutional order.

I spoke with political experts in several other Western nations, all of whom noted that their governments are carefully observing DOGE and, in some cases, taking steps toward establishing efficiency offices of their own.

In Australia, for instance, Conservative Opposition Leader Peter Dutton has established a new “shadow minister for government efficiency,” which Sky News describes as a “DOGE-esque” operation. Dutton said Australians were “sick of the wasteful spending that is out of control under the Albanese government… Be it the 36,000 additional Canberra public servants employed under this government, or the flagrant waste of $450 million on the divisive Voice referendum.”

Germany’s Deutsche Telekom, one of the leading telecom companies in Europe, has also pleaded for a “European DOGE” based on the U.S. model. “What Europe needs is something like DOGE,” Deutsche Telekom CEO Tim Höttges said at the MWC mobile communications trade fair earlier this month, emphasizing that overzealous European Union regulations are impeding the ability of European companies to compete in the global marketplace.

In Britain, Prime Minister Keir Starmer recently promised to “hack back the thicket of red tape” suffocating the economy. While Starmer stopped short of proposing the sweeping-style cuts in the United States and Argentina, his comments were nonetheless a subtle nod to the popularity of DOGE’s platform.

I anonymously interviewed four European economists who analyzed DOGE’s actions so far, all of whom praised its achievements. According to the online DOGE tracker, the office has saved $130 billion by eliminating wasteful contracts and unnecessary spending, amounting to more than $800 per taxpayer.

Elected Democrats and some liberal economists in the United States have disputed these numbers, but one of the European experts I spoke with said that he “wouldn’t focus on initial statistics, as they always need to be recalculated.” Instead, he continued, the more important metric is the “scale of the permanent liquidation” of government offices, such as the U.S. Agency for International Development.

Another individual I spoke with said that what is perhaps more significant than the dollar figure of cuts DOGE has implemented is how it is changing people’s perception of government spending overall. “DOGE fundamentally changes how one thinks about the government, its political philosophy,” he said.

More specifically, DOGE has dispelled at least three prevalent myths about government spending: “that the government is an omnipotent provider, that welfare or grant payments are free, and that Americans are powerless in the face of growing deficits.” For the first time in decades, DOGE has demonstrated that the institutional inertia of the federal bureaucracy can be checked – ever-increasing budgets for obscure agencies are not inevitable.

Another economist I spoke with who advises a European government described this shift as a “groundbreaking achievement and a profound lesson for the West.” Other Western democracies, he said, must “learn from the Trump administration, which took to heart Milton Friedman’s observations that manufacturing jobs make money while government jobs spend it.”

Spanish economist Carlos Iñiguez, who advised his government in the early 1980s, told me the real promise of DOGE is in “reclaiming America’s traditional sense of self-reliance, which means turning away from reliance on government and institutional help by encouraging more volunteerism and community activism with minimal government involvement.”

“The purpose of government and the relationship between citizens and the government will be redefined across all levels of society,” he added.

President Ronald Reagan famously referred to America as a “shining city on a hill” that acts as a beacon of hope and a model of liberty. By taking the lead on eliminating waste, fraud, and abuse, President Trump is paving the way for a restoration of a limited, accountable, and transparent government not just in the United States but around the world.

Ben Solis is the pen name of an international affairs journalist, historian, and researcher.