How is it possible to be worth a trillion?

[aurpod1980]

Is it just utter madness that one man can be worth a trillion dollars ? $1000 billion Wtaf

Yes I think the God complex has kicked in.

My problem is with anyone having that much money & influence.
He is only the first trillionaire (on paper or whatever blah blah blah), there will be others but I personally think it's amoral and just not good for the world in general

And to those people who cite his philanthropy - The NY Times stated that most of what he does is basically a tax dodge or is fuelled by self interest.

I am sure he and Bezos will be instrumental in future space tourism and possibly even people living in space. But is that really what the world needs?

I don't actually hate Bezos as a person. He just runs Amazon well

But you are focusing in on one aspect of what he is trying to do. Tesla has driven the electric car revaluation. Space x has driven the availability of internet access beyond rich countries. 50 years ago the idea of sending a satellite into space was seen as self indulgence but it has revolutionarized people's lives (every time you switch on your sat nav for example, worldwide communication and so on) Just because you don't see value in space tourism it doesn't mean there won't be a huge value in it for mankind.

Like I've said before. I don't like the guy and the path he's taken politically and his influence he has on social media. Just being a devil's advocate and recognising that being and asshole and having a positive influence on society aren't mutually exclusive.

Nothing changes my view that one person having a trillion dollars is an inherently bad thing.

Ok. I'm not saying I disagree with you. I'm just trying to stimulate a conversation.

What if he only had $999,999,999,999,999,999?

Make that $999,999,999,999.

If there was a stock market crash, or the shares of his companies crashed on the stock market, this 'trillion' would vanish without even a puff of smoke.
It is not real money.

But that's true of everyone rich (and of a lot of people who aren't even rich). Or did you think Mark Zuckerberg and Warren Buffet have all theirs in cash under their mattress?

But you won't have the same political power.

What an ignorant and vile comment "he's a waste of skin and dna" 🙄 what an utterly ridiculous thing to say.

Go on, wow us with how many companies you've started, how many 1,000's of people you've given work to and how many innovations you've funded.

How have you changed the world and moved technology forward?

Which he will probably have significantly less than that tomorrow. It's just wooden dollars. He's worth what the company is worth. And what makes that company worth that is people's confidence in him. He doesn't have that money in the bank. Not than it really matters, he has more money than he could ever spend.

Exactly. That's true of anyone you has a pension fund as well. Not just the rich.

I just don't get the "he shouldn't be allowed to be this rich" thing.

He's not some African despot who has diverted the entire wealth of his country to his own personal bank account, he hasn't just inherited it, he's created it.

He has created companies that, collectively, are valued at $1tr dollars - what would you say to him "No, Mr Musk you are too good at this investment, funding, backing and generally facilitating business and innovation thing, you have to stop now" 😂

See, it's such an insane amount of money you aren't even sure how to write this down to take the piss!

No one can really get their head around the amount of money he and other multi billionaires have but we hear about it so often now we are immune to it & people speak about the ultra rich in the same breath as top earners.

None of us really understands this kind of wealth but we try, unsuccessfully usually, to rationalise it.

Musk doesn't have $1 trillion; it is the combined value of his shares in all of his companies.

Which means that he "has" $1 trillion, in the same way that what any other individual "has", as quoted by Forbes, The Sunday Times or just in everyday parlance, is simply the total current value of everything they own.

It's not common for rich people, or any people for that matter, to have everything they own in the form of $1 coins in a very large piggy bank. The naivety it would take to think that they do, could almost be described as "dribbling idiocy".

In what way?

I've not headed a government department responsible for the death of half a million children.

Moving technology on does not excuse this

Who are these half a million children and why is Elon Musk responsible for their death?

Have you read the thread? Any of the links posted previously?

To be honest you aren't worth a massive amount of my time to answer. If you are interested in the basis of what I have said reas about his childhood, along with most other people who are successful to this level and then have a think about who is the dumdum.

Whatever his childhood was, I still refute your sweeping statement that "everyone" has the same opportunities in life.

We both know that's not true. That's what I was talking about, not whatever start in life Musk had.

ETA: I did just look it up and see that Musk was born into a wealthy family so I'm not entirely sure what point you are making and think that maybe you are in fact the "dum dum" here?

Teslas are not shit to a lot of people who happily drive them every day. And however people feel about him, he is investing a huge amount of time and money on innovation projects. Yes, these cannot come into fruition without the engineers and scientists but they also need an investor to out in the cash and resources to make it happen. He is not just sitting on his pile of money living off interests and contributing nothing.

But his money is not buying him a lifestyle. Is enabling him to invest in projects that will take billions to take off the ground. So he should give it all away. Who to? To the earlier poster who suggested giving 1,000 to the poorest people in the world. How many billions have been given away by charities to help eradicate poverty in the poorest, most needy countries? And how much of a difference has this made in the long term? Not a lot, TBH..

Some people seem to imagine he has £ trillion sitting in a bank account.

All wealth held in shares is 'imaginary' until converted into an actual bank balance by selling the shares.
For that matter the same goes for all other non-realised assets, like your house, jewellery, paintings, antiques, etc. etc.
It may be quite likely to hold its value well, but you don't really know what it is worth until you come to sell it. And until you sell it, the only value is the intrinsic use of the item (A house is for living in, a painting is for looking at, etc.)