What is Capitalism?
Capitalism is defined as an economic system based on the private ownership of the means of production and their operation for profit. Characteristics central to capitalism include private property, capital accumulation, wage labor, voluntary exchange, a price system, and competitive markets.
Elon Musk’s contribution to capitalism can be summed up with one word – IDEAS – full stop.
Tesla, SpaceX, The Boring Company, Neurolink, a Neurotechnology company which is committed to making technology that can be implanted in the human brain, so that it can interface with computers, so dwarfs the imagination, that you barely have capacity left to notice PayPal or Zip2.
If his contributions weren’t so incredible, I would have completed this article after the first two paragraphs.
The Elon Musk Story
Elon Musk was born on June 28, 1971, in Pretoria, Transvaal, South Africa, the son of Maye Musk, a model and dietitian from Regina, Saskatchewan, Canada, and Errol Musk, a South African electromechanical engineer, pilot, and sailor. He has a younger brother, Kimbal (born 1972), and a younger sister, Tosca (born 1974). His maternal grandfather, Dr. Joshua Haldeman, was an American-born Canadian. His paternal grandmother was British, and he also has Pennsylvania Dutch ancestry.
Musk appeared on the Joe Rogan podcast in 2018 and caused a stir when he was seen smoking weed, which was offered by the host. The incident didn’t go unnoticed by stockholders as Tesla stocks took a hit as well.
Musk was asked what it was like to be him and what the world would be like if there were more of him. His response was surprising yet revealing. He said, “you probably wouldn’t want to be me”. When pressed by the host as to why, he answered this way, Musk replied, “because I have a steady flow of explosive idea’s”, he went on to say that they never stop and that it would be nice to turn them off every once in a while (paraphrasing).
Musk Creates the Future
To be fair Elon also mentioned that he hardly ever smoked weed because the practice “isn’t conducive to getting stuff done”. He mentioned that his great joy was creating things that made other people happy and further he said the practice of creating things for others made it possible to create a better future and the thought of a better future makes it easier to get up with excitement every morning.
Musk was a avid reader, starting early in his childhood. Issac Asimov’s Foundation series was a great influence. He’s heavily invested in Asimov’s assertion that “you should try to take the set of actions that are likely to prolong civilization, minimize the probability of a dark age and reduce the length of a dark age if there is one.”
Surprisingly, he describes himself as a socialist, not a socialist who takes from those who are productive and gives to those who are unproductive, but a socialist who seeks the greatest good for all. Even through this filter one could not deny Musk’s contribution to Capitalism.
