Elon Musk’s business empire is built on $38 billion in government funding
... Musk is one of the greatest beneficiaries of the taxpayers’ coffers. ... He has been a big beneficiary of national industrial policy, especially Democrat industrial policy, through government funding. ...
About a third of Tesla’s $35 billion in profits since 2014 has come from selling federal and state regulatory credits to other automakers. The credits are given to automakers that meet certain standards, including selling a certain percentage of zero-emission vehicles. Tesla is the largest seller of these credits to automakers that don’t meet the standards and want to avoid paying a fine.
These credits played a crucial role in the company’s first profitable quarter in 2013 and its first full year of profitability in 2020, according to Securities and Exchange Commission filings. Without the credits, Tesla would have lost more than $700 million in 2020, marking a seventh-consecutive year with no profits, according to an analysis of SEC filings.
With the credits, the company instead reported a $862 million profit.
While Musk has advocated for ending the EV tax credit for consumers, he has said little about these regulatory credits. ...
Nearly a tenth of government money that has benefited Musk’s companies
comes from agencies in eight states, including California. ...
In 2016, SpaceX’s success in securing federal contracts prompted rival Jeff Bezos, founder of Blue Origin (and owner of The Washington Post), to say in a company meeting: “Elon’s real superpower is getting government money,” The Post reported. “From now on, we go after everything that SpaceX bids on.”
More.
Musk's many government subsidized businesses are just the currently most prominent examples of American fascism. For bigger ones simply look into the defense industry, the energy industry, or healthcare, or Amazon's early no-sales-tax arrangement which allowed it to become the retail behemoth that it is. President Eisenhower warned us about this long ago, but we're so used to it now that we just take it all for granted.
Real capitalism is swallowed up by the combine between the taxation authority holding a gun to your head, taking your money, and giving it to the corporations.
That's the racket. That's the American way.
