A policy change could make it easier to fire federal workers
The Conversation cites the research of UC Law’s Joseph Tomain
Policy changes coming out of Washington could make it easier to fire some federal workers.
The Office of Personnel Management, or OPM, filed proposed regulations in the Federal Register on April 23, 2025, that would reclassify about 50,000 career civil servants as “at-will” employees, reports The Conversation.
The change would affect an estimated 2% of nearly all of the 3 million federal workers who would then experience a shift in how the government classifies their jobs, renaming their classification “Schedule Policy/Career.”
The Conversation reviewed what happened nearly two centuries ago when President Andrew Jackson fired half of the nation’s civil servant workforce. It was replaced with a spoils system that rewarded political loyalists.
“The result was not only an utterly incompetent administration, but widespread corruption,” write Sidney Shapiro, a professor of law at Wake Forest University, and Joseph P. Tomain, Dean Emeritus and Wilbert and Helen Ziegler Professor of Law, at the University of Cincinnati.
Toman and Shapiro are authors of four books including the one cited in The Conversation titled “How Government Built America.” Tomain’s research and teaching interests focus in the areas of energy law, land use, regulatory policy and contracts.
Read the full story in The Conversation online.
Learn more about Professor Joseph Tomain online.
Featured top image courtesy of Istock.
Related Stories
On track: Hoffman Honors Scholar studies public transit
April 2, 2026
Public transit is where Zane Sawyer’s lifelong passion for travel meets his commitment to making an impact. The University of Cincinnati first-year geography major in the College of Arts & Sciences and member of the second cohort of Hoffman Honors Scholars (HHS) has hit the ground running, designing a research project intended to capture both how public transit works and how its users perceive it.
UC design student works with sports greats in co-op
April 2, 2026
Spectrum News profiles UC College of Design, Architecture, Art, and Planning communication design student Jayden Balwally, who had an internship with the Oklahoma City Thunder and worked with the Heisman Trophy Trust and the College Football Playoff.
UC names Suzanne Judd, PhD, as inaugural director of new Center for Public Health
April 2, 2026
Following an extensive national search, the University of Cincinnati College of Medicine has appointed Suzanne E. Judd, PhD, as the inaugural director of its newly established Center for Public Health. Judd, a renowned epidemiologist and interdisciplinary scholar, will lead the center’s mission to transform community health through innovative research, education and strategic advocacy.