OPINION:
I think it’s great that President-elect Donald Trump has tapped Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy — both CEOs of major corporations — to lead the newly proposed Department of Government Efficiency.
As the operative word is “efficiency” and it’s usually in the DNA of CEOs to make a company more efficient, I propose the first order of business for these two gentlemen be to focus on making the work calendar more efficient for the U.S. economy.
DOGE must set its sites on tying Super Bowl Sunday and Presidents Day together in February, thus eliminating “Blue Monday,” traditionally the least productive workday of the year. The Super Bowl — the biggest party day of midwinter — lasts late into the night and oftentimes, workers call in sick the next day.
No one knows the drag of the Blue Monday phenomenon better than a CEO. Tying it to Presidents Day would severely blunt, if not totally eliminate, the effect.
The second calendar issue that needs to be addressed is the tightening up of Fourth of July week. Instead of having July Fourth as a federal holiday that could fall on any day of the week, Independence Day should be universally celebrated on the first Thursday of July, thus giving the American people the certainty of a four-day, Thanksgiving-like weekend in early summer. It would allow people to make plans without missing work.
I believe these two calendar suggestions would not only make America more efficient in terms of work output and gross domestic products, but happier, too.
As I see it, this would make DOGE an instant success story coming right out of the gate and make people more receptive to subsequent cost-saving suggestions.
LUANA DUNN
Medford, New York
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