It’s official – with a net worth of $ 190 billion at the time of this writing, Elon Musk is the richest person in the world. He also already has an idea of how he is going to spend the money.
The technology entrepreneur, who serves as CEO of electric car company Tesla and space flight company SpaceX, overtook Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos for the top spot. The switch, the Bloomberg Billionaires Index it shows, it is because most of Musk’s calculated wealth comes from owning 20 percent of his electric transport and renewable energy company Tesla. The company’s stock price has skyrocketed in recent weeks, with a current market value of $ 774 billion.
So, what will Musk do with his newly acquired wealth?
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For now, Musk’s wealth is largely in Tesla’s stock. Bezos, which owns more than 10 percent of Amazon, sold its own stock piece by piece – $ 2.9 billion in 2019 and more than $ 10 billion in 2020. That still left him with almost $ 170 billion in shares of Amazon, according CNBC in November 2020. Bezos said his goal is to give about $ 1 billion a year to his rocket launch startup, Blue Origin.
Musk outlined in June 2018 how he plans to sell your stock:
“I have sold more than $ 100 million TSLA to charity. I will do this every few years. Large disbursements in about 20 years when Tesla is stable.”
In terms of the distant future, Musk has already outlined his plans. In October 2018, he wrote on Twitter that “you should ask why I would want money”:
“The reason is not what you think. Very little time for recreation. I don’t have vacation homes, yachts or anything like that. About half of my money goes to help with Earth problems and the other half to help. establish a self-sustaining city on Mars to guarantee the continuation of life (of all species) in case the Earth is hit by a meteor like dinosaurs or World War 3 happens and we destroy ourselves. “
The comments highlight what may be Musk’s most expensive project: a self-sustaining city on Mars of one million people by 2050.
In October 2019, Musk shared the cost of the ambitious project:
- Shipping a ton to Mars can cost $ 100,000.
- A self-sustaining city would require a million tonnes of the closest order of magnitude.
- The city, therefore, would cost between $ 100 billion and $ 10 trillion.
Assuming Musk still plans to spend about half of his wealth in a self-sustaining city, it appears that he may only be able to afford the low-cost budget.
Musk has been criticized for that plan before. Director Werner Herzog described it to Inverse in November 2020 as “obscenity”, while businessman Jack Ma said in August 2019 that Earth “needs more heroes.”
But Musk suggested that the plan doesn’t cost as much as it looks. During his August 2019 participation with Ma, he said the plan would require about half a percent to one percent of the world’s gross domestic product. This figure is among the amounts spent on cosmetics and health.
The World Bank estimated the world gross domestic product at $ 85.7 trillion for 2018, suggesting an expenditure of $ 400 to $ 900 billion. Musk described it as “a smart investment for the future”.
O Inverse analyze – Musk has regularly stated that he wants to use his money to finance his goal in the city of Mars. In May 2020, he declared he was also selling “almost all physical possessions.” Later that month, he said in the Joe Rogan Experience that possessions “kind of weigh on you”.
But Musk’s charitable contributions are under scrutiny. He is a signatory to the Giving Pledge, in which the world’s richest pledge to donate most of their wealth to philanthropy. But The Guardian reported in November 2020 that his charitable foundation, the Musk Foundation, donated only $ 100 million.
AN Quartz an analysis in October 2020 revealed that Musk donated about $ 257 million to the fund. The fund had given 86% of its wealth to three sources, two of which were donor-advised funds. These resources, commonly used by billionaires, are criticized for lack of transparency.
Musk pledged to give half of his wealth to philanthropy or charitable causes. He will have to increase his contributions if he has any chance of meeting that goal in life – a change he suggests would happen around 2038.