elon could solve world hunger literally this second
all he has to do is full stack dump all his shares, cause a stock market recession, wipe out trillions, delete tens of thousands of jobs, and then he'll be able to fund the federal government for about 18 minutes
The moment someone tells you Elon Musk should solve world poverty with his wealth, you're listening to someone who fundamentally misunderstands both wealth and poverty. Musk's billions exist almost entirely as Tesla and SpaceX stock, not cash sitting in a vault waiting to be redistributed.
The real issue runs deeper than liquidity. Poverty is fundamentally a productivity problem, not a resource shortage. If throwing money at poverty solved it, the $4.3 trillion the US government has spent on welfare programs since 1965 would have eliminated American poverty decades ago. Instead, the poverty rate has remained virtually unchanged since the War on Poverty began.
You can't redistribute your way out of poverty because wealth isn't a fixed pie that rich people hoard. Musk created his fortune by building companies that produce electric vehicles, rockets, and satellite internet. His wealth represents the market's valuation of those productive assets. When politicians demand he liquidate those holdings to fund welfare programs, they're demanding he destroy the very capital that generates ongoing prosperity.
The countries with the lowest poverty rates didn't achieve that through foreign aid or wealth transfers. South Korea went from Third World to First World status in two generations through property rights, free markets, and rule of law. Meanwhile, sub-Saharan Africa has received over $1 trillion in foreign aid since 1960 and remains impoverished. Poverty reduction requires institutions that enable production, not redistribution schemes.
Real poverty reduction happens when entrepreneurs like Musk build productive enterprises that create jobs, generate tax revenue, and drive down costs through innovation. But that requires you to understand that capitalism creates wealth rather than just moving it around.
Oh yes, I remember that Bond film where the villain decarbonized the auto industry, brought fast internet to everyone on the planet, and helped paralyzed people interact with the world again.
Under capitalism, socialists are free to build socialism.
Under socialism, capitalists aren’t free to build anything.
Nothing stops a group of socialists pooling their money, forming a company, and splitting every wage and every pound of profit perfectly equally.... Or to donate all profit to the government.
It’s legal. It’s easy. Owning the means of production is as simple as setting up a company.
Marx wrote his manifesto before the invention of limited liability companies. Back then “seize the factory” meant seizing it from the handful of families who could afford one.
That argument expired the day anyone could start a company with limited liability, raise investment and hire who they want.
Socialists are free to lead by example and demonstrate their system works. They can out-recruit, out-motivate, out-build and out innovate based on their ideas if they like. It would prove the philosophy works. Capitalism will happily host their experiment.
The fact that nobody does this tells you a lot.
NOW: Mamdani says his admin will transfer ownership from bad landlords to non-profits.
“For buildings that have suffered chronic neglect, we will work to transfer ownership to responsible stewards.
Stewards that include community land trusts, non-profits, or even the tenants themselves.”
They changed the shape of the pill for my anxiety medication and I’ll bet you can’t guess what that made me feel. You’d think they’d have put a warning label of some kind.