Chamath’s statement on the podcast is explicitly conditional and framed in terms of potential: he says the U.S. economy “could be growing at 4 or 5%” but doesn’t, because of regulatory burden, and that the opportunity for DOGE is to “wipe as many of these regulations off the books” and then selectively reenact needed ones. This is not a time‑bounded forecast but a counterfactual claim about what could happen under a very aggressive deregulation scenario that has never actually been tried. (speakai.co)

What actually happened with DOGE and regulation

After the episode, President Trump’s second term did formally establish the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) via executive order on 20 January 2025, reorganizing the U.S. Digital Service and creating DOGE teams in agencies. Subsequent orders tasked DOGE and agencies with reviewing regulations, workforce reductions, and contract/grant reforms, but these orders emphasize review, prioritization, and rescinding certain rules—far from literally wiping the vast bulk of federal regulations and then reenacting only a small subset. (whitehouse.gov) DOGE’s own communications highlight specific deregulatory actions and claimed savings, not a near‑total reboot of the Code of Federal Regulations. (doge.gov) In late 2025, DOGE was quietly disbanded months before its planned end date, with its functions partially absorbed into other entities—again indicating the radical, comprehensive deregulation Chamath described was never implemented. (reuters.com)

Observed GDP growth

Real U.S. GDP growth has remained in the 2–3% range: about 2.8% in 2024, with official projections around 2.0% for 2025 and 2.1% for 2026, well below the 4–5% annual growth he discussed. (en.wikipedia.org) But because the extreme deregulatory scenario he posited (wiping a very large share of regulations and rebuilding from zero) never occurred, these actual growth outcomes do not directly test his counterfactual claim.

Why this is scored as ambiguous

• The prediction is conditional (“if DOGE wipes the regulations and then reenacts only necessary ones”) and expressed as what the U.S. economy could achieve, without a clear time horizon.
• The necessary condition—a sweeping, near‑total deregulation and rebuild of the federal rulebook—has not happened; only partial, contested DOGE‑linked reforms took place before the initiative was wound down.
• Because we have never observed the world Chamath is talking about, we cannot empirically say whether that scenario would have produced 4–5% real growth.

Given that the condition has not been satisfied and the statement is inherently counterfactual and non‑time‑bounded, it cannot be cleanly judged as right or wrong based on current data. It is therefore best classified as ambiguous rather than correct, incorrect, or merely “too early.”