DOGE’s Next Chore

[T[he Trump administration’s long-term task should be to create within DOGE some version of what former Manhattan Institute scholar Jim Manzi called a Federal Experimental Agency, a body that undertakes to rate the effectiveness of government social policy programs in the same way the Congressional Budget Office assesses the budgetary impact of spending on those programs. At the core of this project would be a requirement that any initiative aimed at achieving a social policy goal—whether through legislation or executive order—include clear metrics for its success or failure, along with mechanisms to reduce or eliminate funding for programs that fail to deliver results.