Musk, the World's First Trillionaire - Is He Worth It?

[VK3DRB]

Someone said to me recently "Elon Musk is about to become a trillionaire. What's your excuse?" I didn't answer the question which bordered on being offensive. But it got me thinking.

Musk is exceptional, becoming the richest man in history owning as much as 3% of the US GDP in net worth. He started as a Commodore 64 "script kiddy" but has advanced to design and build advanced electronics, electric vehicles, space rockets, and global banking systems. He works harder and smarter than pretty much anyone else on the planet, and is a visionary. But some may think he is the most greedy person on the planet, having donated less than 1% of his wealth to charity in stark contrast to Gates.

Most of us here can't design space rockets, might know little about finance, but we can design and build electronics. We might earn about a millionth of his wealth in our lifetime if we are lucky. Put simply, none of us are nowhere near as smart and astute as Musk, whether we like it or not.

Has he EARNT his wealth by his technical and business skills? In fact, is anyone possibly worth $1 trillion?

[Renate]

In what products has he actually been involved in the design? Nothing.

[newbrain]

In what products has he actually been involved in the design? Nothing.

One, and we all see how good it is.

[Psi]

So much copium around the success of his companies.

Yes, he's done a shit ton more than you, just deal with it. It doesn't make you less because someone is doing more.
Just be happy he's putting the money he gets back into useful or cool things, instead of anonymously sitting on a megasuperyacht somewhere drinking $50000 bottles of wine like most other mega rich people choose to do.

[mtwieg]

The elevated status of people like Musk is, IMO, one of the clearest signs of decadence in the west. Maybe 10-15 years ago I could understand someone having a good impression of him. But now there's really no excuse, he's obviously a twisted charlatan. But in the west, money excuses everything. It's simply assumed that someone with so much money must be entitled to it, and it's a good idea to give them even more money.

If you haven't seen the Behind the Bastards episode on Musk, do yourself a favor. Even as a Disney movie villain he's over the top.

He has no real engineering background, but that's irrelevant IMO. No amount of technical expertise excuses the stuff he does. His cuts to USAID alone are estimated to result in a body count in the millions. There's a special place in hell reserved for people like him.

So much copium around the success of his companies.

Yes, he's done a shit ton more than you, just deal with it. It doesn't make you less because someone is doing more.
Just be happy he's putting the money he gets back into useful or cool things, instead of anonymously sitting on a megasuperyacht somewhere drinking $50000 bottles of wine like most other mega rich people choose to do.

This isn't jealousy over his money or fame. He doesn't just sit on a yacht drinking harmlessly. He went out of his way to destroy food aid, HIV treatment, and anti-malarial programs, for no other reason than because he thought it was "woke" or some nonsense.

[brucehoult]

In what products has he actually been involved in the design? Nothing.

You are absolutely right, no question. Musk just happened to be standing in the corner of the room, doing nothing useful, when ...

- electric cars turned from golf carts and Sinclair C5 to desirable high performance sports cars. including the world's (and most regions) #1 selling single car model

- Falcon 9 1) got made, 2) got designed for cheap serial manufacturability, 3) perfected landing on a drone ship as well as on land at the launch site, 4) turned into a rapidly and cheaply reusable booster with the leading example now at 35 flights in 5 years (June 3 2021 to June 8 2026) and about to overtake the expensively refurbishable Shuttle "Discovery" with 39 flights in 27 years. Atlantis did 33 and Columbia 28, Endeavour 25. Other active Falcon 9 boosters have done 34, 32, 31, 28, 28, 26, 24, 22, 22, 16, 16, 16, 13, 12, 10, 10, 7, 7, 6, 6, 3, 2, 2, 2.

- Starlink bumped satellite internet from a couple of Mbps to hundreds, with plans starting at $45 and zero-cost terminals (with either a 12 month commitment, or returning the hardware if you cancel depending on the region, promotions etc). It gives service in rural areas, remote areas, polar areas, the middle of the amazon, the middle of every ocean.

- Superheavy/Starship are on the verge of 100% reusability, in days (possibly in hours) between flights with the largest rocket ever flown. And also very very cheap and fast to build.

[Psi]

So much copium around the success of his companies.

Yes, he's done a shit ton more than you, just deal with it. It doesn't make you less because someone is doing more.
Just be happy he's putting the money he gets back into useful or cool things, instead of anonymously sitting on a megasuperyacht somewhere drinking $50000 bottles of wine like most other mega rich people choose to do.

This isn't jealousy over his money or fame. He doesn't just sit on a yacht drinking harmlessly. He went out of his way to destroy food aid, HIV treatment, and anti-malarial programs, for no other reason than because he thought it was "woke" or some nonsense.

He went after the rampant corruption inside USAID, not after food aid, HIV treatment, and anti-malarial programs directly.
Any repercussions for food aid, HIV treatment, and anti-malarial drugs was sadly collateral damage and exactly why the corruption was so rampant in there. Anyone trying to stop it gets blaimed for stopping the small amount of good it was doing. 
Maybe there was a better way to fix it without the collateral damage, but I doubt it given how hard the pushback was. Any attempt to slow down and sort things out carefully would have taken so long nothing would have got done.
But personally I do think he probably should have stayed out of politics, but then again it's hard to say. I do not know what he knew about what was going on in there.
It's really hard to judge someone's decision to act when you don't know what they knew.

[Simmed]

i hope he has a sudden interest in the RAM prices
and suddenly makes alot of ram
i dont mind if he tries to be the biggest RAM mfr in the world
making alot of good things, is a good thing
it makes good things cheaper
 

[Psi]

i hope he has a sudden interest in the RAM prices
and suddenly makes alot of ram
i dont mind if he tries to be the biggest RAM mfr in the world
making alot of good things, is a good thing
it makes good things cheaper
 

TerraFab, once built and fully operational, will be making RAM for the xAI chips, hard to say if that will take any pressure off RAM prices though.
It would probably only do that if they make more than they need and sell the rest.

[Renate]

SpaceX has done a great job getting reliability and economics on satellite services. No argument there.
I just don't think that all the credit (and money) should flow to Musk.

[brucehoult]

SpaceX has done a great job getting reliability and economics on satellite services. No argument there.
I just don't think that all the credit (and money) should flow to Musk.

He does own 46% of it, and therefore nominally his wealth is 46% of the value of SpaceX. (plus other things such as about 15% of Tesla)

Would any of it have happened if Musk wasn't there standing around doing nothing useful? Why didn't anyone else do any of it, or even try, before Musk's companies proved it is possible?

Much of what Musk's companies have done was judged not just financially losing but actually impossible by competitors, before the fact.

[brucehoult]

Much of what Musk's companies have done was judged not just financially losing but actually impossible by competitors, before the fact.

This was a particularly amusing incident.

Tory Bruno, at the time President and CEO of SpaceX competitor United Launch Alliance, posted that it was unfair for SpaceX to compare photos of a partially assembled Raptor 3 engine (without external pumbing) with ULAs engines.

Gwynne Shotwell, President and CEO of SpaceX, replied the same day with a photo of the "partially assembled" engine firing.

Shotwell's tweet is still there. Bruno's was rapidly deleted.

https://x.com/Gwynne_Shotwell/status/1821674726885924923

[SiliconWizard]

SpaceX has done a great job getting reliability and economics on satellite services. No argument there.
I just don't think that all the credit (and money) should flow to Musk.

Well, so your point is not that Musk has done nothing to deserve being rich, your point is probably that you find it unfair that he has gotten insanely rich while there are thousands of people who have worked for his businesses, made it all a reality, and who have gotten only crumbs. If so, yes, welcome to our world, which is based on pyramid organization. This has nothing to do specifically with Musk.

[Stray Electron]

In what products has he actually been involved in the design? Nothing.

  And tell me who get richer; Nickola Tesla or George Westinghouse?  Benjamin Henry or Oliver Winchester?

   The inventor/designer of a product seldom reaps the rewards but the visionary that develops and markets the idea does.

   Do I think that Musk is worth $1T or that he should be worth $1T? No, but I'm not the stock market either so this is a totally pointless  question to ask.

[wilfred]

This was a particularly amusing incident.

Tory Bruno, at the time President and CEO of SpaceX competitor United Launch Alliance, posted that it was unfair for SpaceX to compare photos of a partially assembled Raptor 3 engine (without external pumbing) with ULAs engines.

Gwynne Shotwell, President and CEO of SpaceX, replied the same day with a photo of the "partially assembled" engine firing.

Shotwell's tweet is still there. Bruno's was rapidly deleted.

Yeah but it's not the most comprehensive argument for cementing the future of SPACE-X. It troubles me that the listing rules were changed for SPACE-X. That's a bit of a red flag. I'm about to find out if I should have invested money in it. I didn't.  And so are a lot of others.

[Renate]

Why is so much personal antagonism going on here?

I'm off.

[UnijunctionTransistor]

I love reading biographies of great men/ women, and as far as I have been able to read, about all of these overachievers is that they are always prime son-of-a-bitch examples.

Those are almost always fanatically driven individuals who will stop at nothing and no one who stands between them and their objectives. You may call them obsessively driven, you may call them assertive assholes.
But the key fact is they have a vision and are fully committed to it, and will bulldoze mercilessly anything and anyone that becomes an obstacle.

BTW, this not only applies to business people, but politicians, rulers, explorers, you name it.

Having said this, I deeply dislike Musk. Although this doesn’t prevent me from thoroughly respecting his accomplishments.

[Randy222]

Valuations are mostly over-valued. 

However, being valued does = power, ......... at least in the world we live.

[temperance]

Valuations are mostly over-valued.

Perhaps The greatest heist in history.

[free_electron]

At least he doesn't spend his money on mega yachts, 25 mansions and 5 day weddings in Venice or other stuff that doesn't advance anything.

He employs lots of people and puts his money where his mouth is. He's willing to risk all he has and has done that on several occasions ( Tesla, Spacex nearly went bankrupt several times which would have personally bankrupted him as well. he even sold his posessions to save tesla). When's the last time all those other rich poofs have done anything like that ?

He enables things. If he sees a good idea he will go flat out funding it. Of course he doesn't do everything himself but he does understand technical stuff. He attracts the right people that are willing to go the extra mile. That's not always without issues as well. Turnover is large and you better be prepared for long hours and a lot of effort. But the rewards can be enormous. The Spacex IPO has made a lot of employees multi-millionaires. the same happened with Tesla. A lot of people that were there from the beginning and rode it out for 5+ years walked away with handsome compensation for their efforts.

So before you criticize him : look at what all the other Billionaires are doing with their wealth and then draw your conclusion.

I can't complain. I was at Tesla for 10 years. It was amazing.

[tom66]

I can't in good faith support a man who aligns himself with Trump, who I consider to be leading the USA towards fascism.  Whether or not you accept that is up to you, but it is how I see the situation.  He has also shown himself to be a serial liar, is transphobic and homophobic, racist, and sexist.  Too many lines crossed, no one is perfect, but Musk is the antithesis of who we should support.

[PlainName]

Interesting take on this from Robert Reich over in The Grauniad:

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2026/jun/12/spacex-ipo-elon-musk-trillionaire

It is not favourable. And, as he notes, we are all investors in SpaceX now and don't have a choice.

[temperance]

It is not favourable. And, as he notes, we are all investors in SpaceX now and don't have a choice.

Indeed, and when things come crashing down, the losses are ours. I stated this earlier, a few weeks ago: we are anyhow the losers.

[Psi]

Why is so much personal antagonism going on here?

I'm off.

To be fair, the first example of that was you when you said Musk did "nothing" in terms of product design.

Has he EARNT his wealth by his technical and business skills? In fact, is anyone possibly worth $1 trillion?

Most of his success is just his management style. Getting rid of HR, non-technical managers, pointless meetings, jobs that are not actually building products or supporting those that do, and making sure all staff have stock options so they have a good incentive to do good work.
A lot can be done if you get the right engineering and problem solving people into positions of power where they can do the work to innovate and optimize in an ongoing loop.

In most companies you only get to build it once or maybe twice (one costdown rebuild). And then it's sold and you have to move on to the next project. These companies loose out because the engineers never get to build awesome products that have been optimized to perfection for the user and for price.

[Smokey]

SpaceX has done a great job getting reliability and economics on satellite services. No argument there.
I just don't think that all the credit (and money) should flow to Musk.

Well, so your point is not that Musk has done nothing to deserve being rich, your point is probably that you find it unfair that he has gotten insanely rich while there are thousands of people who have worked for his businesses, made it all a reality, and who have gotten only crumbs. If so, yes, welcome to our world, which is based on pyramid organization. This has nothing to do specifically with Musk.

Just from the recent SpaceX ipo info, about 4400 employees are set to become millionaires.  Those are some tasty crumbs.
https://www.xataka.com/empresas-y-economia/gracias-a-spacex-elon-musk-convertira-a-4-400-empleados-millonarios-paso-se-convertira-primer-billonario

That does not change the fact that Elon is still a dick.  But he is a dick who's companies have consistently taken engineers and made them pretty rich engineers.  Even the ones who bailed without stock options (for whatever crazy reason) still got paid to work on cool cutting edge stuff and got a pretty nice entry in their resumes.