Federal workers’ retirement paperwork is processed by hand in a limestone mine located in Boyers, Pennsylvania. This unusual setup was highlighted by Elon Musk during a press conference with President Donald Trump at the White House. Musk, who leads the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), described the facility as a “time warp” where about 700 employees work 230 feet underground to manage approximately 10,000 retirement applications each month.
The process involves manually handling paper documents stored in manila envelopes and cardboard boxes. According to a report by Business Insider, the mine has been used by the Office of Personnel Management (OPM) since 1970. Efforts to digitize the system have repeatedly failed, costing over $130 million since 1987. Musk criticized the inefficiency, noting that the speed of processing is limited by the mine shaft elevator, which sometimes breaks down, delaying retirements.
“And then the speed, the limiting factor is the speed at which the mine shaft elevator can move, determines how many people can retire from the federal government,” Musk said. “And the elevator breaks down and sometimes, and then you can’t, nobody can retire. Doesn’t that sound crazy?”
The mine, originally excavated by US Steel, has been a storage site for federal records since 1960.
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