Musk’s Long Term Plans Are Really Far Out

Elon Musk likes to get his own way. When his offer to assist in the Thai children’s cave rescue was rejected, he accused the team leader of pedophilia. He moved Tesla corporate headquarters to Austin after California required temporary Covid-related health orders, which Musk called “fascist” in an expletive-laced rant. He’s refused to release a low-cost EV — even though he once referred to the model as “pivotal” to the company’s future — and instead, perseverates over self-driving vehicle research. Many of his decisions are spontaneous and lack forethought, yet, ironically, Musk’s long term plans are intensely conceived — a combination of his unique worldview, data-driven insights, and intelligent automation.

It’s a messy confluence.

Another Musk Feud, Another Excuse To Spend & Influence

Musk’s hundreds of millions spent on Donald Trump’s re-election weren’t enough to keep the peace between the two megalomaniacs. Nor was Musk’s heil salute at Trump’s inauguration.

Last month US President Donald Trump’s feud with Musk reached a threshold. Billions of dollars in subsidies that Musk’s companies receive from the federal government suddenly were at risk. Trump posted on his own social media site that Musk might receive more subsidies “than any human being in history, by far,” adding: “No more Rocket launches, Satellites, or Electric Car Production, and our Country would save a FORTUNE.”

Musk shot back by criticizing the Big Beautiful Bill and threatening to fund oppositional candidates who voted for it. “The latest Senate draft bill will destroy millions of jobs in America and cause immense strategic harm to our country,” Musk wrote on his own social media site. “It gives handouts to industries of the past while severely damaging industries of the future.”

He called out Republican legislators who voted for the BBB. “Shame on those who voted for it: you know you did wrong. You know it,” he wrote. He subsequently swore to step back from political donations and threatened to fire lawmakers who “betrayed the American people.”

On Saturday, Musk declared the launch of his new political party — the America Party. So far Musk has pledged to support Representative Thomas Massie (R-KY) in his reelection campaign. Other details haven’t been released. As Giselle Ruhiyyih Ewing of Politico notes, establishing a third party involves “a series of thorny obstacles including navigating complex state laws, ballot access regulations, and other legal hoops.”

Always needing to have the last word, Trump responded to Musk’s third party announcement. “I am saddened to watch Elon Musk go completely ‘off the rails,’ essentially becoming a TRAIN WRECK over the past five weeks.  He even wants to start a Third Political Party, despite the fact that they have never succeeded in the United States.”

It’s About The Brand, Stupid

During all this chaos, Musk has had to confront concerns that his absentee status at Tesla, SpaceX, Tesla, xAI, and X have hurt those brands. Musk’s companies have a pattern in which problems repeat, over and over, due to his failure to tame chaos and improve efficiency (DOGE: Do what I say, not what I do). Add to that Musk’s many thoughtless claims and actions, and disdain for him and his brands continues to run deep.

Success measures at Tesla have been particularly impacted by brand association with Musk. As the first decade of Tesla rising star ended, Musk shifted the all-electric car company’s brand away from its original status as a relevant pioneer to that of an isolated anti-woke icon. Previously loyal fans aren’t buying in; a recent survey concluded that consumers no longer perceive the Tesla brand as safe, family-friendly, or trustworthy.

In May, institutional investors with 7.9 million Tesla shares wrote to board chair Robyn Denholm, citing serious concerns.

“Tesla’s stock price volatility, declining sales, as well as disconcerting reports regarding the company’s human rights practices, and a plummeting global reputation are cause for serious concern. Moreover, many issues are linked to Mr. Musk’s actions outside of his role as Technoking and Chief Executive Officer at Tesla, including his high-profile role as an architect of the US Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE).”

The letter urged the board to announce several reforms, including:

• establishing clear time commitments for any new CEO compensation plans;
• adopting and disclosing a clear succession plan for management;
• adopting and disclosing an over boarding policy for directors that specifically limits outside board commitments at both public and private companies; and,
• appointing at least one new truly independent director with no personal ties to other board members.

About the same time, the New York Times revealed that Musk’s drug habit “went well beyond occasional use.” His consumption included ketamine, Ecstasy, psychedelic mushrooms, Adderall, and a daily medication box that held about 20 pills.

Musk’s Long Term Plans: Moral Equivalence?

“You want to wake up in the morning and think the future is going to be great — and that’s what being a spacefaring civilization is all about. It’s about believing in the future and thinking that the future will be better than the past. And I can’t think of anything more exciting than going out there and being among the stars.”

-Elon Musk

Musk’s long term plans do focus on humanity. Tesla started off with the mission to help expedite the move from a mine-and-burn hydrocarbon economy toward a solar electric economy; it has since extended into autonomous vehicles and humanoid robots. He founded SpaceX to carry humans to Mars and other destinations in the solar system. Neuralink aims to restore autonomy to those with unmet medical needs and unlock new dimensions of human potential.

What ties all these missions together? Musk is an adherent of longtermism, the idea that positively influencing the future beyond our own lives is a key moral priority. It requires that we have the same obligations to people yet to be born as we do to the present generation. Considered the philosophy’s founder is a 35-year-old Scottish philosopher, William MacAskill. He’s the author of What We Owe the Future (2022) and argues the next stage of the civil rights movement is to protect the rights of those who will live millions of years in the future.

It’s a particular and rather troubling moral equivalence because crises, suffering, and mass death in the near-term are acceptable if it means retaining the promise of a long term future for humanity.

In 2023, Musk said artificial intelligence becoming “far smarter than the smartest human” was “one of the existential risks that we face, and it’s potentially the most pressing one.”

He frequently refers to an inevitable future in which humans can no longer inhabit the Earth. “The sun is gradually expanding, so we do at some point need to be a multiplanetary civilization because earth will be incinerated,” Musk said.

Musk’s long term plans always include technology, which he feels is the cure for current and future ails across nearly all domains. “For the first time in the four-and-a-half-billion-year history of earth, it is possible to extend consciousness beyond our home planet,” he said on Joe Rogan’s podcast in February.

In a long-running legal battle between Musk and Tesla shareholders over his projected $55.8 billion compensation package, an email emerged that he wrote to a company lawyer in 2017, as reported by the New York Times.

“The added comp is just so I can put as much as possible toward minimizing existential risk by putting the money toward Mars if I am successful in leading Tesla to be one of the world’s most valuable companies. This is kinda crazy, but it is true.”

Uh huh.