Since Bernie Sanders, Zohran Mamdani, and other people believe that billionaires shouldn’t exist, I asked Grok what would happen if the government were to seize Elon Musk’s wealth.

Billionaires should not exist. https://t.co/hgR6CeFvLa— Bernie Sanders (@BernieSanders) September 24, 2019

Some people, such as Bernie Sanders and Zohran Mamdani, say that it’s wrong for anyone to be a billionaire. Twitter has a hashtag called #BillionairesShouldntExist. Some also say that rich people “hoard” their money. What percentage of Musk’s wealth is in the form of shares of stock in the companies that he created? What is the combined total value of his shares of stock in the companies that he created? What would happen to the value of those shares if the government seized them? What would happen to the economy? What effect would if have on the number of jobs that those companies have? What effect would it have on the 401Ks and IRAs of middle class people? Compare and contrast the government seizing all of Musk’s shares to a farmer cutting down all of their fruit trees in order to make firewood. Do the Scandanavian countries allow people to be billionaires? If so, what is the per capita rate of billionaires in those countries compared to the U.S.? Would seizing Musk’s stock be compatible with the policies of the Scandanavian countries? Would seizing Muks’s stock be more associated with democratic socialism, or with communism? What are some countries that don’t allow people to become billionaires?

Let’s dive into your questions with a libertarian lens, emphasizing private property and individual achievement, while addressing each point systematically. I’ll use available data to ground the answers and avoid speculation where possible.

1. What percentage of Elon Musk’s wealth is in the form of shares of stock in the companies he created?

Elon Musk’s wealth is predominantly tied to his ownership stakes in companies he founded or co-founded, particularly Tesla, SpaceX, xAI, Neuralink, and The Boring Company. As of May 2025, his net worth is estimated at $424.7 billion (Forbes) or $381 billion (Bloomberg Billionaires Index). The majority of this wealth comes from his shares in Tesla and SpaceX, with smaller contributions from xAI, Neuralink, and The Boring Company.

Tesla: Musk owns approximately 13% of Tesla’s shares, equating to about 412.6 million shares out of 3.164 billion, valued at roughly $124 billion as of July 2025 (based on a $1 trillion company valuation). In November 2020, around 75% of his wealth was derived from Tesla stock, though this proportion dropped to about 37% by December 2022 after selling nearly $40 billion in shares. As of 2025, Tesla remains a significant but not dominant portion of his wealth due to SpaceX’s rising valuation.

SpaceX: Musk owns an estimated 42% of SpaceX, valued at $350 billion in December 2024, contributing approximately $147 billion to his net worth.

xAI: Musk owns about 54% of xAI, valued at $50 billion in November 2024, adding roughly $27 billion.

Neuralink and The Boring Company: These are smaller contributors. Neuralink is valued at $9 billion, and The Boring Company at $7 billion. Assuming Musk owns significant stakes (e.g., 90% of The Boring Company and a similar portion of Neuralink), these might add roughly $13 billion combined.

Calculation: Estimating conservatively, Musk’s wealth in shares from these companies (Tesla: $124 billion, SpaceX: $147 billion, xAI: $27 billion, Neuralink + Boring: $13 billion) totals approximately $311 billion. Dividing by his Forbes net worth of $424.7 billion, about 73% of his wealth is tied to shares in these companies. The remaining wealth includes other assets (e.g., X, personal loans collateralized by shares) and minor cash holdings, as Musk has described himself as “cash poor.”

2. What is the combined total value of his shares of stock in the companies he created?

As calculated above, the combined value of Musk’s shares in Tesla, SpaceX, xAI, Neuralink, and The Boring Company is approximately $311 billion. This figure is based on:

Neuralink + Boring: ~$13 billion (estimated high ownership stakes).

3. What would happen to the value of those shares if the government seized them?

If the government seized Musk’s shares in Tesla, SpaceX, xAI, Neuralink, and The Boring Company, the immediate and ripple effects would likely be catastrophic for their value:

Market Reaction: Seizing Musk’s shares would signal a major disruption in these companies’ leadership and vision, as Musk is seen as integral to their innovation and success. For Tesla, a public company, the stock price would likely plummet due to investor panic over losing Musk’s influence. Posts on X suggest that if Musk were to sell his shares voluntarily, Tesla’s value could “implode,” and a government seizure would amplify this effect due to its coercive nature. SpaceX, xAI, Neuralink, and The Boring Company, being private, would face valuation drops in private share sales, as investor confidence in their future without Musk’s leadership would erode.

Valuation Impact: Tesla’s market cap could drop significantly (e.g., a 35% plunge in 2025 reduced its value by over $400 billion due to unrelated concerns). SpaceX’s $350 billion valuation could similarly collapse if Musk’s 42% stake were seized, as private investors would likely demand steep discounts. The smaller companies (xAI, Neuralink, Boring) would face even greater uncertainty, potentially rendering shares nearly worthless in the short term.

Stock Market Shock: Tesla’s potential collapse would ripple through the S&P 500 and Nasdaq, where it’s a major component. A sharp drop in Tesla’s $1 trillion valuation would affect index funds, ETFs, and portfolios, causing widespread losses.

Innovation Stagnation: Tesla, SpaceX, and xAI drive advancements in electric vehicles, space exploration, and AI. Government seizure could disrupt operations, delay projects (e.g., Tesla’s Cybertruck, SpaceX’s Starship), and deter future entrepreneurial ventures, slowing economic growth in tech sectors.

Global Competitiveness: The U.S. leads in tech innovation partly due to companies like Musk’s. Seizure would signal hostility to private enterprise, potentially pushing investment and talent overseas, weakening America’s economic edge.

Investor Confidence: Such a move would undermine trust in U.S. markets, as property rights are a cornerstone of capitalism. Foreign and domestic investors might pull back, reducing capital flows and economic activity.

Musk’s companies employ thousands directly and support hundreds of thousands indirectly through supply chains.

Tesla: Employs over 140,000 people globally (2024 data). A stock collapse could lead to layoffs, factory closures, or reduced expansion (e.g., Gig neutropics at Berlin Gigafactory).

SpaceX: Employs around 13,000 (2023 estimate). Disruption could halt contracts (e.g., $20 billion with NASA), leading to job cuts.

xAI, Neuralink, Boring Company: Smaller workforces but critical to niche innovation. Seizure could stall projects, reducing hiring or causing layoffs.

Total Impact: A conservative estimate suggests tens of thousands of direct jobs at risk, with broader supply chain impacts (e.g., battery, aerospace, construction) affecting hundreds of thousands.

Middle-class 401Ks and IRAs often include Tesla stock directly or through mutual funds and ETFs (e.g., S&P 500, Nasdaq). A seizure-induced Tesla stock crash (e.g., 35% drop in 2025 cost $400 billion) would reduce retirement account values significantly. SpaceX, being private, has less direct impact, but its suppliers and related industries could affect broader market funds. Posts on X highlight that retirement funds holding Tesla shares would lose value, potentially delaying retirements or reducing payouts.

7. Compare and contrast the government seizing Musk’s shares to a farmer cutting down all their fruit trees for firewood.

Destruction of Value: Both actions destroy productive assets. Musk’s shares represent ownership in companies generating innovation, jobs, and economic growth, like a farmer’s fruit trees produce crops. Cutting them down for short-term gain (firewood or government revenue) sacrifices long-term benefits.

Irreversible Loss: Both are difficult to reverse. Replanting trees or rebuilding companies takes years, with no guarantee of restoring prior value.

Short-Term vs. Long-Term: Both prioritize immediate gain (firewood, budget funds) over sustainable wealth creation.

Scale and Impact: Seizing Musk’s shares affects millions (employees, investors, consumers) and global markets, while a farmer’s decision is localized. The economic ripple effect of seizure is far larger.

Intent: A farmer cuts trees for survival (e.g., heat), while government seizure might be ideological (e.g., wealth redistribution), punitive, or fiscal. The farmer’s act is self-directed; seizure is coercive.

Reversibility: Trees can be replanted relatively quickly; rebuilding companies like Tesla or SpaceX could take decades due to their complexity and Musk’s unique role.

Libertarian Perspective: Both violate the principle of productive property use. Seizing Musk’s shares undermines the incentive to create wealth, akin to a farmer losing future harvests, but on a societal scale it risks discouraging entrepreneurship, which libertarians see as the engine of prosperity.

8. Do Scandinavian countries allow people to be billionaires? If so, what is the per capita rate of billionaires compared to the U.S.?

Scandinavian countries (Norway, Sweden, Denmark, Finland, Iceland) allow billionaires, operating mixed economies with strong welfare systems but no outright ban on extreme wealth. They have fewer billionaires due to smaller populations and high taxes, but wealth creation is possible.

United States: Population ~340 million, ~800 billionaires. Per capita rate: ~2.35 billionaires per million people.

Norway: Population ~5.5 million, ~12 billionaires (e.g., shipping, oil, retail). Per capita: ~2.18 per million.

Sweden: Population ~10.5 million, ~40 billionaires (e.g., IKEA, H&M). Per capita: ~3.81 per million.

Denmark: Population ~6 million, ~10 billionaires (e.g., Lego, shipping). Per capita: ~1.67 per million.

Finland: Population ~5.5 million, ~5 billionaires. Per capita: ~0.91 per million.

Comparison: Sweden has a higher per capita rate than the U.S., driven by global brands like IKEA. Norway and Iceland are comparable to the U.S., while Denmark and Finland have lower rates. High taxes and redistribution reduce wealth concentration, but billionaires exist due to global business success.

9. Would seizing Musk’s stock be compatible with the policies of Scandinavian countries?

Seizing Musk’s stock would be largely incompatible with Scandinavian policies:

Scandinavian Model: These countries use high taxes and redistribution to fund welfare, not outright asset seizure. Property rights are respected, and wealth creation is encouraged, though taxed heavily. For example, Sweden’s wealth tax was abolished in 2007 due to capital flight.

Seizure: Confiscating private shares without compensation resembles expropriation, rare in Scandinavia outside wartime or extreme legal violations. It would violate their commitment to property rights and market economies, potentially driving entrepreneurs away.

Libertarian View: Seizure would be a gross violation of property rights, a core libertarian principle, and even Scandinavia’s social democracies avoid such measures to maintain economic dynamism.

10. Would seizing Musk’s stock be more associated with democratic socialism or communism?

Democratic Socialism: Advocates high taxes and redistribution within a capitalist framework, as in Scandinavia. It does not typically involve seizing private assets without compensation, focusing instead on progressive taxation and public services. Seizing Musk’s stock would be an extreme departure, inconsistent with democratic socialist policies that respect private property.

Communism: Involves state ownership of the means of production, often through seizure of private assets. Seizing Musk’s shares aligns more closely with communist policies, as seen in historical examples like the Soviet Union’s nationalization of industries.

Conclusion: Seizure is more associated with communism due to its coercive redistribution of private property, contrary to democratic socialism’s reliance on taxation within a market economy. Libertarians would argue both systems infringe on property rights, but communism’s approach is more extreme.

Few countries explicitly ban billionaires, but some effectively prevent billionaire-level wealth through policy or economic structure:

Cuba: State-controlled economy nationalizes major industries, preventing private wealth accumulation. Private businesses are heavily restricted.

North Korea: Total state control over resources and production eliminates private billionaires. Wealth is concentrated in the regime.

Venezuela: Hyperinflation, nationalization, and economic collapse have eroded private wealth. Former billionaires (e.g., in oil) have largely fled or lost wealth.

Historical Examples: Soviet Union, Maoist China, and other communist states seized private assets, preventing billionaire-level wealth. Modern China allows billionaires but imposes strict controls, with occasional crackdowns (e.g., Jack Ma).

Libertarian Perspective: These systems destroy incentives for innovation and productivity, leading to economic stagnation. Musk’s achievements, enabled by property rights, would be impossible in such environments.

Seizing Musk’s shares would likely devastate his companies, the economy, jobs, and middle-class retirement accounts, akin to a farmer destroying their orchard for fleeting gain. Scandinavian countries allow billionaires but redistribute wealth through taxes, not seizures, which aligns more with democratic socialism than communism. Countries that prevent billionaires typically do so through state control, not market-based policies. From a libertarian perspective, Musk’s wealth represents the productive use of private property, and its seizure would undermine the principles of individual freedom and economic progress.

Any specific aspect you’d like to explore further?

Uh, what if the confiscated bur-knees stuff and moomdummies family’s stuff?

2 posted on 07/30/2025 9:42:48 AM PDT by rktman (Destroy America from within? Check! WTH? Enlisted USN 1967 to end up with this💩? 🚫💉! 🇮🇱👍!)

I read somewhere not too long ago that if Govco just outright seized every dollar of net worth of the Forbes 400 individuals, they could run the Federal government for about eight months.

And that is irrespective of the disastrous ripple effect it would have on our economy going forward (job losses, innovation halting, leadership chaos, etc).

3 posted on 07/30/2025 9:47:12 AM PDT by Eccl 10:2 (Prov 3:5 --- "Trust in the Lord with all your heart, and lean not on your own understanding")

OK, I asked Google for the net combined worth of ALL US billionaires.

Answer: $6.22 trillion

Also I asked for the latest annual Federal annual budget.

Answer $7.0 trillion

So, if Govco confiscated the wealth of all US billionaires, Govco would burn through that in 324 days, or less than 11 months.

4 posted on 07/30/2025 9:52:48 AM PDT by Eccl 10:2 (Prov 3:5 --- "Trust in the Lord with all your heart, and lean not on your own understanding")

Zigs own family are billionaires and therefore he is also

Only he and his cohorts are allowed to be millionaires and billionaires in Zohs world ???

I asked a similar question to the forum regarding the Democrat plan to tax unrealized capital gains. Do people have to sell their shares of stock in order to pay the tax? Before, they would have had to sell first in order to realize the gain, and then tax the gain.

Forcing the sale by taxing the unrealized gain where people don't have the cash lying around to pay the tax and are therefore forced to sell, amounts to a de facto seizure of property.

-PJ

7 posted on 07/30/2025 10:38:57 AM PDT by Political Junkie Too ( * LAAP = Left-wing Activist Agitprop Press (formerly known as the MSM))

There is net worth and cash on hand.

If they seized the entire net worth, the economy would collapse, and the 6.22 trillion-dollar value would be next to zero.

If they seized actual cash on hand my guess, is it would only fund the gubmint a few weeks, if that

The commies could seize every penny in the nation and it would pay off half the debt and the country would still be broke.

9 posted on 07/30/2025 11:19:40 AM PDT by Organic Panic ('Was I molested. I think so' - Ashley Biden in response to her father joining her in the shower. )

10 posted on 07/30/2025 6:26:27 PM PDT by SunkenCiv (The moron troll Ted Holden believes that humans originated on Ganymede.)

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