Elon Musk is from the future. And he has already made history – PRAVDA.sk

The richest person in the world who admits that he often contributes to the social network Twitter when he sits in the toilet? Yes, that’s Elon Musk too. According to a prestigious poll by Time magazine, he is a billionaire, an entrepreneur and an inventor in 2021.

“He’s a humanist. Not in the sense that he’s a nice person, because he’s not,” Robert Zubrin, the founder of Mars Society, which supports the idea that humanity should build permanent bases on the red planet, told Musk for Time magazine. “He wants to see eternal glory for doing great deeds. It is good for the human race. Musk defines great deeds as something that is great for humanity. He longs for glory. For him, money is the means, not the ultimate goal. Who evaluates Thomas Edison today according to whether his inventions were able to make money? ”Zubrin, who met Muska in 2001, recalled.

At the time, he was “only” a millionaire who decided to support the Mars Society with a generous sum. Today, Musk is the richest man in the world. As of December 14, his assets were estimated by Forbes magazine at $ 252.5 billion. Second in line is Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, who has $ 194.4 billion.

Visionary and businessman

He also owns space rockets and pigs with a chip in his brain. Elon Musk was born on June 28, 1971 in Pretoria, South Africa, where his father, his mother, is from Canada. She has a younger brother and sister. He studied economics and physics at the University of Pennsylvania. In 1995, Musk began his doctorate at the prestigious Stanford University, but after two days he left it and became fully into business. He co-founded Global Link Information Network, a software company bought by Compaq for $ 305 million in 1999 under the name Zip2.

“Muske’s biggest asset is that he is the most visionary business leader on the planet, at least since Apple founder Steve Jobs died in 2011. He also has brilliant marketing. Whether it’s his vision, himself or his companies,” he said. Truth David Yoffie of Harvard Business School at Harvard University.

He certainly has imagination. In 2004, he joined Tesla. At that time, the segment of electric vehicles was in its infancy, but now it seems that Musk had a very good idea of ​​the direction the automotive industry would take. But the billionaire’s dreams have always gone beyond planet Earth.

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In 2002, SpaceX was officially born. Six years later, the Muskov Falcon 1 became the first private-funded rocket to enter space. Last year, the Falcon 9 and the manned ship Crew Dragon brought the first humans into space.

“From the beginning, the goal was to get life on other planets and allow humanity to become a civilization of space travelers,” Musk told Time now, saying he doesn’t do it for money, but because it’s exciting. the thing will be to build a city on Mars that can exist on its own and bring animals and creatures from Earth there. Something like the futuristic Noah’s Ark. However, we will take more than just a few, it was strange if there were only two, “said Musk.

Is the richest man in the world serious or joking? It’s not entirely clear, and Musk himself admits that his jokes don’t always work. The settlement of Mars will probably not survive the billionaire. However, cosmonautics professor at the University of Southern California Mike Gruntman thinks that Musk has made history.

“It has a major impact on the way the space industry and government space programs work. Musk’s aggressive approach has changed the way customers, designers, manufacturers and managers work. He has introduced innovative practices into the space industry that have dramatically accelerated development, reduced costs and broken many “The commercial part of the space industry has also grown significantly thanks to Musk’s vision and enthusiasm. Its influence is and will be visible for many years to come,” Gruntman told Pravda.

However, the selection of Musk as the personality of the year has its critics. The billionaire is known for his controversial approach to new technologies. In 2020, Gertrude, who had a chip in his head, introduced the public. At Neuralink, Musk develops the idea of ​​an implanted communication interface between the brain and machines.

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Problems and taxes

“He also has his weaknesses. Musk acts as a micro-manager, has a problem leaving someone in charge, and then loses very talented people. He repeatedly takes great risks, which has almost destroyed his companies. He doesn’t respect the authority of government agencies and sometimes pushes the boundaries of use. “Yoffie’s problems.”

However, the biggest debate over Time has been triggered because the world’s richest man has not paid much income tax in recent years. Musk repeatedly defends that his property is primarily shares and does not even own a house.

“Let’s change the crooked tax rules so that the personality of the year actually pays taxes and stops feeding on others,” Democratic Sen. Elizabeth Warren wrote on Twitter.

“If you opened your eyes for two seconds, you would find that I will pay more in taxes this year than any American in history,” Musk told politician.

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The billionaire sold part of his Tesla shares and will have to pay tax. According to CNN, it will be at least $ 7.6 billion. However, it is not the case that Musk is happy to contribute to the US budget. Under the 2012 agreement, he had the opportunity to sell the shares in 2022 at the latest. However, it is possible that the Democrats will reform the tax rules. If the super-rich waited with the sale, he would probably pay even more in taxes next year.

However, Time defends his choice of personality of the year. And he does so with a great deal of nostalgic return to a mythical America. According to the magazine, it is easy to describe Muska as an arrogant super-villain, for whom money is the motivation and uses space rockets as toys. “But he’s a mogul and a builder. Musk is a man of the future in which technology can achieve anything, but at the same time offers a return to a glowing industrial past before America began to stagnate and stop producing things. Now he’s just creating rules, restrictions, limits , barriers and Facebook, “wrote Time.