Should I be looking for a different job?
See if you can gum up the works, and if you feel yourself changing, get out.
Of course, as long as the work you do doesn’t become hostile to your own beliefs. I mean, people that process social security still provide benefits to millions of people no matter who is in charge, at least until Republicans destroy it.
The answers to both of your questions are probably yes it’s okay, and yes you should probably be looking for another job.
Are you morally/ethically okay with your agency’s mission? With your role in it? If you are, then the new administration’s policies may not be reason enough to leave. You pretty much have to work somewhere. If the answer is no, you probably would have already been looking for another job.
Should you be looking for another job? Probably, depending on what your agency is and it’s mission. If TFG and Project2025 have their way, many federal government agencies will be defunded and/or privatized, and pretty much toothless when it comes to enforcement. We already saw what happened to the EPA under the first Trump administration. If yours is in danger of that you should be preparing a backup plan. I wouldn’t want to give up a government job, but I would want to be ready if I got RIF’d, or if I got fed up with the bullshit.You work for the government, not for whatever yoyo happens to be President at any given time. You wouldn’t necessarily leave a private sector job if the CEO changed.
OTOH, this administration has been making a point of wanting to make government so small they can drown it in the bathtub. Unless you work in one of the very few Project 2025 priorities, they will probably eliminate your job eventually. So keep a keen eye out for alternatives.
I’d leave my job if Musk would become CEO at my job.
Bro I may sabotage it until I get dismissed and use that insider information to short his stock. See how elmo likes being on the losing end of stock manipulation.
I’d say it’s more important than ever. Leaving just allows the “yes” men to get more power and gives more control to the regime you dislike/disagree with.
Resist
So assuming you’re an American. I hate to break it to you but your government has done way worse stuff than elect an orange guy. I seriously doubt everything done holds up to the slightest scrutiny to your moral and ethical code. The only difference is now you are aware of it. If it was me I would ask myself if I felt guilty for the work I had done already. If I did I would stop if not I wouldn’t.
At the very least, make them fire you. Don’t quit.
If you’re working for the government, you had no morals and integrity before.
Huh? This is an edgy thing to say.
We need taxes filed and mail delivered. Environment monitored and earth science conducted. Etc. There’s countless jobs that are apolitical and vital to everything worth anything in a modern society.
Do you feel that your “customers” are the administration or the general public? Whom do you feel that you are serving in your job? Do you feel that the directions given to you by your administration are legal and safe and reasonable? Do you feel that the directions given to you by your administration cause a disadvantage to yourself or your “customers”?
You could try to clutch at straws to justify staying in your job. You might be able to reasonably determine that your feelings for your administration don’t affect the performance of your job. Maybe staying in your job is the best way to benefit your “customers” and obstruct the administration.
Only you can decide how you feel and what is an appropriate match for your own moral and ethical position.
Maybe you should leave the country if it upsets you that much
That’s not out of the question yet.
Just leave! Hit da bricks! Who cares what you need to leave behind, emigrating is super easy anyway. Just decide to go, every country in the world would love to have another American within their borders.
If administration does not change agency’s policy in the the way it contradicts your moral I’d say it’s ok
Working for the agency isn’t the problem on its own. If your job requires you to do something that is against your morals, resist up to and including loudly leaving that job if that’s what’s required. But until then it’s more important than ever to stick it out and push to make things better any way you can.
Unfortunately, thatt’s a question only you can answer. But goes without saying for any job.
Ask yourself:
- Will you be able to sleep peacefully at night knowing what job you’re doing and who you’re doing it for?
- Are your morals stronger then job security you’re getting?
- Can you stay on the job and inact change from within?
- Can you refuse certain tasks you don’t feel conformable with?
- Can you steer / influence the work that you and/or the agency does?
The first Trump presidency is known for the longest government shutdown in US history.
Job stability is not a given for federal employment anymore.
Other than that, I would say non-defense jobs are certainly worth maintaining institutional knowledge.
So long as you have some savings, a government shutdown is more a vacation than anything. Back pay has always been given to employees.
I would not be surprised if this was repealed (if only as an effort to further purge government employees):
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Government_Employee_Fair_Treatment_Act_of_2019
Prior to this, my understanding is that back pay was given in good faith, not by actual requirements.
10s of Thousands of people motivated by not getting a week or so of pay because you couldn’t get your act together is bad for reelection prospects.
No one can answer that question but you.
Of course. But one can hope for insight and help in answering it, no?
Yes.
Schindler couldn’t do it alone.
