Fascinated by the sheer amount of emotional reactions here.
Musk’s $5.7B Mystery Gift Went to His Own Charity
31–40 of 343 posts
Re: Musk’s $5.7B Mystery Gift Went to His Own Charity
#32If I had money to donate I'd donate it to the charity I thought would be most effective at helping the cause I cared most about. If I had enough money to create my own charity it would be focused on the cause I cared most about. My giant ego and hubris would make it hard for me to come to the conclusion that a charity I created wasn't the most effective at its goals, even if that didn't happen to be the case.
All true and a perfectly valid model.
But also try:
If I were incredibly wealthy and obsessed with running the score up, I’d see any taxes or other loss of wealth as a threat to my ego.
If my tax accountants came to me and said I could have a greater net worth by founding a charity optimized for my personal benefit, I’d happily shuffle money there rather than paying taxes.
I think that’s also a valid model. I don’t have enough info to have a strong opinion, but my priors on Musk make me at least question what he’s optimizing for.
Re: Musk’s $5.7B Mystery Gift Went to His Own Charity
#33Re: Musk’s $5.7B Mystery Gift Went to His Own Charity
#34Earlier quoted context omitted.
And can’t be clawed back in bankruptcy. Great way to preserve wealth
You're by definitions giving it away. It does nothing to preserve your own wealth even if it goes to a charity you control. It's no longer your wealth and unless you want to do something illegal its not coming back to you and can't benefit you.
Past a certain point the goal of having money is the ability to wield influence. If you donate money to charity you control you can still use that charity to wield influence.
Re: Musk’s $5.7B Mystery Gift Went to His Own Charity
#35Not a real brilliant long-term move. Why?
Tesla's premise is that they can balance not having large revenues in manufacturing for a period of time to build out the EV industry as Tesla's major revenue is in fact carbon tax credits. The problem is the competition is far greater in resources than Elon has guessed and that will tend to blind-side soon.
Or in short words, Elon is spending stuff he no longer in the future has.
Re: Musk’s $5.7B Mystery Gift Went to His Own Charity
#36This reads like a hit piece, and a poorly executed attempt if so. This is standard practice and not uncommon. If we’re going to excoriate billionaires for putting their name on a foundation, shouldn’t Gates, DeVos, and others also be held to the same scrutiny? The article throws in an SBF comparison simply because both parties support the same brand of altruism.
Agreed. Also it’s not like Musk was going around saying look at me. I donated 5.7 billion to charity.
The hive mind is ridiculous
Re: Musk’s $5.7B Mystery Gift Went to His Own Charity
#37The classic billionaire tax move. Donate money to your own foundation to work on things you want while getting a big tax break.
How does the tax break work? Don't you still have to pay income and/or capital gains tax on everything that goes into the fund minus a pretty small amount?
I don't have experience donating to a charity that I created, so rules may be different, but in general no you don't pay any tax on donated in-kind securities and the amount of the deduction you take is generally the market value of the securities on the day they were transferred.
Re: Musk’s $5.7B Mystery Gift Went to His Own Charity
#38This reads like a hit piece, and a poorly executed attempt if so. This is standard practice and not uncommon. If we’re going to excoriate billionaires for putting their name on a foundation, shouldn’t Gates, DeVos, and others also be held to the same scrutiny? The article throws in an SBF comparison simply because both parties support the same brand of altruism.
>If we’re going to excoriate billionaires for putting their name on a foundation, shouldn’t Gates, DeVos, and others also be held to the same scrutiny?
Yes.
Re: Musk’s $5.7B Mystery Gift Went to His Own Charity
#39So in the same way that Bill Gates donates to his own foundation?
https://www.cnbc.com/2022/07/13/bill-gates-donates-20-billio...
Re: Musk’s $5.7B Mystery Gift Went to His Own Charity
#40If I had money to donate I'd donate it to the charity I thought would be most effective at helping the cause I cared most about. If I had enough money to create my own charity it would be focused on the cause I cared most about. My giant ego and hubris would make it hard for me to come to the conclusion that a charity I created wasn't the most effective at its goals, even if that didn't happen to be the case.
All true and a perfectly valid model. But also try: If I were incredibly wealthy and obsessed with running the score up, I’d see any taxes or other loss of wealth as a threat to my ego. If my tax accountants came to me and said I could have a greater net worth by founding a charity optimized for my personal benefit, I’d happily shuffle money there rather than paying taxes. I think that’s also a valid model. I don’t h…
I think he's probably optimizing for both. Don't hate the player, hate the game.