Elon Musk Is Nonetheless Saying Loopy Issues About “Period of Abundance,” Amongst Different Issues

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I actually can’t comprehend how somebody with a lot cash and talent to rent folks to assist him perceive issues may be so fully indifferent from actuality. Or maybe that’s what a trillion {dollars} does to an individual. Surely, although, there is no such thing as a excuse for Elon Musk — his fully fantastical concepts concerning the world can’t be excused away or brushed apart. He continues to say loopy issues whereas proving the other along with his personal actions.

I’ve written a bit concerning the subject of this text prior to now, however in a current interview, Musk reiterated some beliefs and expounded on them, and I do really feel like I’ve to return to them as nicely since 1) they’re so absurd, 2) they relate to what he has been doing with the #2 EV firm on the earth (beforehand #1, by the way in which). Right here is the section of his current interview with The Economist editor-in-chief Zanny Minto Beddoes that I’m referring to:

Some key traces:

• “Cash received’t matter in 2036.”
• Requested about whether or not there must be way more redistribution from folks like him to folks shedding their jobs, and whether or not he wanted to pay extra tax, he mentioned: “I feel that the Treasury ought to merely concern folks checks.”
• Requested about how that wouldn’t result in inflation, Musk mentioned: “This stuff have been related prior to now. They won’t be related sooner or later.” He additionally went on to say that robots can be offering so many items and companies that these items would basically be free and thus cash wouldn’t matter.

Everybody on the earth might be fed and offered shelter proper now. There’s loads of cash on the earth for this. However they aren’t, as a result of the techniques people have created don’t care sufficient about people who find themselves on the underside of the financial system.

“Round 733 million folks confronted starvation in 2023, equal to at least one in eleven folks globally and one in 5 in Africa, in response to the most recent State of Meals Safety and Vitamin within the World (SOFI) report,” WHO wrote in 2024. “In 2023, round 2.33 billion folks globally confronted average or extreme meals insecurity, a quantity that has not modified considerably because the sharp upturn in 2020, amid the COVID-19 pandemic. Amongst these, over 864 million folks skilled extreme meals insecurity, going with out meals for a complete day or extra at occasions. This quantity has remained stubbornly excessive since 2020 and whereas Latin America exhibits enchancment, broader challenges persist, particularly in Africa the place 58 p.c of the inhabitants is reasonably or severely meals insecure.”

Naturally, we all know that Elon Musk spent his temporary time in US authorities slashing USAID, which is anticipated to result in greater than 1,000,000 deaths. It was a very merciless motion. The “excuse” is that Musk thought all of that cash was going to complement corrupt folks committing fraud and never a single individual has died from the cuts — whilst journalists have travelled to locations affected by the cuts and talked to folks about youngsters and infants who’ve positively, particularly died from the sudden lack of funding, meals, and medication. I merely can’t imagine that Musk might be so dumb as to assume chopping USAID wouldn’t result in folks dying.

And, yeah, in 10 years, robots are going to be making every little thing from automobiles to airplanes to TVs so cheaply that everybody can have every little thing they need and there’s no want for cash. Actually? A star soccer participant received’t make a fortune, permitting him to purchase issues the remainder of us can’t afford? Everybody can have a lot stuff so cheaply that people who find themselves additional expert and proficient at issues received’t receives a commission extra for his or her work? And the robots will in fact train our children, run our colleges, write and produce TV exhibits and flicks, and handle all of our well being wants, yeah? No must pay people to be docs and nurses?

Anyway, again to the interview. Because the interviewer brings up, how are we going to get to such a utopia as folks steadily lose their jobs. In response to Musk, the US Treasury ought to merely concern folks checks. How is that to be funded? Musk went into full disaster mode concerning the nationwide debt a number of occasions, and he didn’t concede in any respect that billionaires and trillionaires and firms must pay extra in taxes with a view to fund the federal government with a view to write these checks. As some commenters not too long ago mentioned, maybe Musk has holes in his mind from sure drug use. Who is aware of? However one thing is clearly going mistaken if he can’t join a handful of dots in a method that is sensible in the true world.

In the USA as we speak, round 48 million folks — or one in seven People — stay in food-insecure households. Does the biggest financial system on the earth not manage to pay for to guarantee that these 48 million folks don’t have to fret about meals — not to mention well being care! Why can’t the tremendous wealthy nation merely write folks checks in order that they are often nicely fed? Why can’t the US guarantee that everybody can afford well being care? Do I must go down the route of detailing how many individuals die or go bankrupt or undergo from the excessive price of well being care in US society?

Are robots, inside 10 years, going to shortly deliver low cost meals and well being care to each American to the purpose that there is no such thing as a precise want for cash? How insane do you need to be to assume that is going to occur?

What does this must do with Tesla? I’m glad you requested. It has a number of issues to do with Tesla:

1. In Elon Musk’s thoughts, it’s Tesla Optimus humanoid robots which can be going to create this age of abundance. So, Musk is pouring cash into their growth, and now even their manufacturing regardless of the product not being able to ship on its guarantees. (Heard that one earlier than?)
2. Musk has been diverting assets away from creating extra electrical automobile fashions with a view to concentrate on these different issues. In impact, he has been weakening the corporate’s automotive enterprise when he ought to have been strengthening it with a view to keep its former place because the #1 EV maker on the earth.
3. And right here’s the large one: If that is his degree of logic and assumption, if it is a demonstration of his connection to actuality and talent to forecast, how can anybody belief any of his selections or forecasts concerning the firm’s merchandise and enterprise? If he genuinely thinks there will likely be no want for cash in 10 years, how can we belief that his 5- to 10-year roadmap for Tesla isn’t additionally fully looney and indifferent from actuality?

I’ll simply finish with a handful of feedback I noticed underneath the brief video embedded above:

• “He says this however isn’t he planning on promoting the robots…for cash…”
• “And meals is simply touchdown in your plate free of charge, as a lot because the folks or robots who produce meals, received’t want cash to supply both, similar for electrical energy? Oh I forgot, these are not any prices for him and are payed along with his pocket cash.”
• “anybody who has grown their very own meals is aware of that yields with out fertilizer constantly diminishes. Vegetation want meals similar to we’d like meals. How will robots assist make this course of free?”
• “i imply whenever you’re value $900B you might have a distorted sense of actuality…”
• “Economics lesson 1 (first 5 minutes): desires are infinite.”
• “He’s not the primary individual to say this and he received’t be the final . . . each time, they’ve been mistaken.”
• “he assumes that each one these items and companies will likely be distributed equally amongst folks, and we merely know that this received’t be the case. p.s. what I imply by ‘equally’ isn’t communism or socialism, it’s only a honest system by which nobody is systematically denied entry to items and companies in a world the place cash stops being the technique of trade.”
• “There’s no method the billionaires would allow us to stay a life with out us giving all of them our cash”
• “I feel the query to ask would have been, ‘How do the wealthiest folks on the earth maintain onto their wealth and standing with out cash?’ That might have been fascinating to take heed to.”
• “Don’t use medication is the true message”
• “I don’t assume we’ll even see the brand new roadster in 10 years.”

The unhappy factor is that there are additionally a ton of individuals within the feedback shopping for this nonsense and considering Musk is correct. Maybe the subject of one other article….

Featured picture by Artur Skoniecki from Pixabay