The Deferred Resignation Program cost is now at the center of a dispute over whether the program ultimately saved taxpayers money. OPM Director Scott Kupor argues that a roughly $9.5 billion one-time expense could produce more than $40 billion in annual savings. Critics say that calculation leaves out important costs and attributes broader workforce reductions to the DRP.
How Does the 400% Return Calculation Work?
Kupor’s argument starts with a $9.5 billion figure for paid administrative leave in 2025. GAO estimated that agencies spent about $9.5 billion on paid administrative leave overall, with approximately $6.7 billion associated with the Deferred Resignation Program cost. Kupor uses the full $9.5 billion for his calculation.
He then points to a reduction of roughly 270,000 federal employees and estimates the fully loaded annual cost of those employees at more than $40 billion. The argument is that if those positions remain eliminated, the government avoids those costs every year. That produces what Kupor describes as a 400% annual return and a payback period of less than six months.
The Problem: Not All of Those Reductions Came From DRP
The roughly 270,000 figure represents the broader reduction in the federal workforce. The DRP was only one part of that effort. GAO separately estimated that about 144,000 employees in the agencies it reviewed used paid administrative leave associated with the program.
That doesn’t mean the DRP produced no savings. It means the savings attributable specifically to the program are harder to isolate.
What About the Jobs That Came Back?
The Partnership for Public Service found that more than 20,500 people had subsequently been hired into the same agency subcomponents and occupational series as employees who left through the DRP. It also found that those new hires averaged about 1.4 General Schedule grades lower than the employees who departed.
OPM disputes the methodology, arguing that occupational series and agency subcomponents are too broad to prove that an individual position was actually replaced. OPM notes that the same analysis shows roughly 85% of DRP separations had no such match.
So, Did the DRP Save Money?
GAO itself said OPM does not have a reliable way to track the actual cost of paid administrative leave used specifically for workforce-reduction efforts, making it difficult to determine whether the government’s long-term savings goals are being met. That’s the key distinction behind the Deferred Resignation Program cost debate.
The administration’s calculation focuses on payroll costs avoided when positions disappear. Critics argue that a complete calculation also needs to account for backfilling, recruiting and training, lost institutional knowledge, and any impact on agencies’ ability to perform their missions.
The 400% figure is therefore best understood as Kupor’s calculation based on a particular set of assumptions, not a settled measure of the program’s actual return.
More data will be needed to determine how many positions stay eliminated, how many are eventually refilled, and what those workforce changes mean for government spending and performance.
