Given that our readers pay attention to such things, you may have already heard, but WaPo blew another gasket (I hope they have that special “repair” insurance for that recurring problem). Tesla, whose vehicles they were happy to watch burn eleven months ago, has offered its founder a trillion-dollar ten-year thing.
The gazillionaire innovator will receive 100 billion per year (in compensation) for the next 10 years to continue innovating for the EV maker. As for WashPo, they are less concerned with how Tesla managed to succeed, such that they have the means to afford it, or whether Musk’s contributions, past and future, are worthy. Instead, they compared it to the earnings of other groups of people.
Musk’s 100 billion annual “salary” is $3 billion more than the combined salaries of America’s 1.4 million elementary school teachers?
I think the gap should be bigger, and if you check public records, you’d agree. I know Elementary school teachers in my neck of the woods earning 80K plus benefits. Do Kindergarten teachers need to make that much? Homeschool moms get better results for their time and effort.
Multiply that exorbitant salary by the number of them, then walk up the grade school ladder until you reach a grade where it might make some sense.
I’m not sure there are High School positions that should earn that much, and for what—half to two-thirds of the kids who “graduate” can’t read at grade level.
Administrator pay is worse for the same severely bad results.
How much wealth and opportunity has Musk created for others? His estimated worth is 470 billion. He may well live to be the world’s first trillionaire. And despite the Left’s notions, he didn’t steal it; he accumulated it through productivity that generated wealth, very likely several times his own.
Tesla’s Market cap is 1.34 trillion. SpaceX – $350 billion. Twitter – $43 billion. And he has a long list of others from PayPal to Starlink, Neuralink, SolarCity, OpenAI, and that adds up.
Does Musk’s contribution result in more productivity, wealth, learning, and value in a year than taxpayer investment in 1.4 million elementary school teachers?
If we’re talking ROI, I think he does and then some, except that we can’t know whether the public school system could, accidentally, produce future Elons or enough productive geniuses to exceed that per annum. Probably. The odds are in their favor, but here’s the thing.
The real question is whether taxpayer investments in public schools could result in not just better learning outcomes but also other productivity and value, because we find or create better learning costs less, freeing up that money for other things.
WaPo will never ask that because “elementary school teachers” is an emotional comparison, not a financial one. The issue isn’t comparing Musk’s Tesla compensation to the combined annual wages of cashiers, human resources specialists, or even pipetfitters. It is about value. And while there is value in all of those jobs, at the end of the year, can it compete with where people like Sk make their wealth available to create the jobs and opportunities that require these or any jobs?
And is that a better investment than what currently passes for an elementary school education?
