Ethan Marcotte resigned at 18F not even a year after getting on the team, doing exciting things – because it’s tied to the U.S. government, and the DOGE-istas crossed principles he set up for himself.

The principles are like exit strategies you would use in investing: they help to make a (morally) good decision early, so that when the stressful time comes, you can follow the plan and won’t be swayed by emotion.

Ethan’s principles delinate when continuing to work for the government is no longer morally defensible. What tipped the scale was one of three he mentioned:

The third was being asked to meet with someone who didn’t work for the government, and being asked to discuss what I did for work.

Under normal circumstances, that “kill switch” sounds like it should never trigger. After all, when would you be (somewhat forcefully, I presume) asked by people outside your company about your work?

But it appears like the DOGE puppies are doing just that:

Shortly after the announcement, I started hearing about folks who’d had their meetings, but that they didn’t meet with the director who said they’d be conducting the interviews. Instead, they found themselves on a call with people who wouldn’t say where they worked in government; in a few cases, some people wouldn’t disclose their last names, or any part of their names.

What a weird thing to do. This sounds like a shitty spy movie move. And they’re not even the CIA: If they were, they’d probably all be introducing themselves as John Smiths, because a fake persona is better than refusing to tell your name. Humans don’t react well to that.

Quitting that lovely job once his interview was on the horizon, Ethan recognizes how lucky he really is:

And look, being able to leave is, flatly, a privileged option: I can’t not work forever, but I can not work for a little bit. Most of my coworkers didn’t have that option. Some had just bought a house; some returned from parental leave, only to learn they might be losing the jobs they’d counted on to support their families.

Practical constraints like have their way to sabotage our values. Having a house, family, and mortgage makes resigning from an otherwise secure job (with an amazing team no less!) a very unhealthy choice very quickly.

As financial ‘gurus’ will tell you, having savings to survive for months or even a year without a job is a key ingredient for true independence. You can only make “dependent” choices otherwise.

Nassim Taleb mentions this in passing in Antifragile: optionality is an important part of survival.