Nothing makes any sense:
Declining sales, which could lead investors to sell off their stock, hurt Tesla’s value — which accounts for much of Musk’s net worth. He owns nearly 411 million shares of Tesla, or 13% of the company.
And declining sales would lead to layoffs at Tesla.
The protesters oppose Federal job layoffs – but appear to favor layoffs at private companies affiliated with Musk, thereby hurting employees who have no control over Musk either.
Tesla employed just over 125,000 people at the end of 2024. SpaceX employs over 13,000 people.
It also hurts other investors in Tesla. There are an estimated 6 to 7 million individual shareholders in Tesla.
More Tesla Superchargers have been set on fire, more Tesla dealers have been vandalized including windows shot out and vehicles set on fire, and more privately own Tesla vehicles have been damaged: Oregon Tesla owner worried as car damaged in Tigard Tesla store shooting | kgw.com
Per some reports, these protests and actions are funded by ActBlue Astroturf operations – and are not just occurring spontaneously.
At this point I have given up carrying about climate because it is now apparent that it never had anything to do with the climate: Climate: They never cared about climate – Coldstreams. I explain why, there. I live in a solar PV powered house and drive a solar PV charged EV, plus we significantly updated home insulation, lighting and other attributes to the point our household carbon emissions are 1/10th that of the typical American home. We will have spent tens of thousands on efficiency improvements, but at this point, I ask why? I have a 150 page list of climate hypocrites who want to put mandates on everyone – while they jet about the world. Rules for us but not for them.
But at this point, I no longer a damn.
The Media Failed (Again)
The media has failed to report on why layoffs are occurring at the Federal government. The US deficit can grow as long as the economy grows faster. For at least two decades, the deficit is growing faster than the economy and will eventually lead to the collapse of the government and the US economy – think Great Depression but worse. The Federal government’s path is not sustainable.
Should the government raise taxes? Economists think there is an ideal level of taxation to maximize a social utility function – too low, and maximum benefits are not achieved. To high, and people change their behavior and the government collects less revenue.
There are many models that purport to identify an ideal tax rate – the problem is, all of them are based on the biases of the economists and their definition of maximum social utility. The end result is there probably is an ideal tax rate but we have no valid way to determine what that is.
Another pop meme is to have, say, a 100% tax on billionaires. Last time I did that calculation, if the government confiscated all of the assets of the top 500 billionaires, we would literally fund the government for days.
The problem is a desire to spend money (borrowed and printed) on infinite desires when we have only finite resources. No politician is honest enough to point this out – so they continue to spend money we don’t have, to be paid off in the future by a smaller population. Do you see the problem now? The US might start to decrease within a couple of decades; already, many grade schools are closing throughout the entire U.S. due to declines in enrollment and this wave has just begun to hit colleges, which are also seeing closure of departments, degree programs and sometimes entire colleges.
We have learned from DOGE that the Federal government is missing controls on much spending – often throwing money at programs and NGOs who fail to deliver anything. There is no return on investment. It’s just bleeding the country.
The media is not explaining the problem, and why the government needs to right size to our actual economy before it explodes and destroys the entire country in a few decades. We are on track for interest payments on the debt to eventually consume everything – and we are out of funding for Social Security and Medicare within ten years..
We can disagree with the lack of transparency around DOGE, a lack of clarity as to how decisions are made, concerns with Musk’s involvement – but we need to have a serious and accurate discussion about why a DOGE-like program is necessary. If we expect the United States to exist at the end of the century we need to right size the government to the economy we have – and even without doing that, we should always be striving to improve efficiency and effectiveness. The US government is not a peak performance organization.
Musk’s actions are harming his brands
At a minimum, Musk should have taken a leave of absence from his companies while participating in DOGE. To not have done so is a serious error. He is closely identified with his companies, and thus, his actions lead to push backs against his companies – which can negatively impact his employees and his customers. (See for example: ‘I felt nothing but disgust’: Tesla owners vent their anger at Elon Musk | Automotive industry | The Guardian)
Unfortunately, with the many idiots in media, we do not get an informed perspective – only a culture of outrage. The media failed – again.
