Elon Musk’s distaste for the U.S. is starting to become palpable – and U.S. citizens should not take to it kindly.
The Tesla CEO – who has made himself billions off the back of U.S. government subsidies and the U.S. taxpayer – took to the “Daily Drive” podcast on Friday to make it clear exactly what country his allegiances lie with.
On the podcast, reported by CNBC, he called the people of China “smart” and “hard working” while at the same time calling U.S. citizens “entitled” and “complacent”. He specifically called out both New York and California, states whose taxpayers have literally funded Tesla’s business with massive tax breaks amounting to billions.
When asked about China as an EV strategy leader worldwide, Musk responded: “China rocks in my opinion. The energy in China is great. People there – there’s like a lot of smart, hard working people. And they’re really — they’re not entitled, they’re not complacent, whereas I see in the United States increasingly much more complacency and entitlement especially in places like the Bay Area, and L.A. and New York.”
He then compared the U.S. to losing sports teams: “When you’ve been winning for too long you sort of take things for granted. The United States, and especially like California and New York, you’ve been winning for too long. When you’ve been winning too long you take things for granted. So, just like some pro sports team they win a championship you know a bunch of times in a row, they get complacent and they start losing.”
Recall, Tesla secured $1.6 billion in loans from the Chinese government to help build its Shanghai factory, which helped the company resume normal operations post-Covid this year.
Musk – apparently completely devoid of any humility to the amount of money he has received from the U.S. taxpayer – defended his company by say it hadn’t received as much government support from the Chinese government as most competitors: “They have been supportive. But it would be weird if they were more supportive to a non-Chinese company. They’re not.”
Tesla’s total government assistance in the U.S. has surpassed $4.9 billion, according to CNBC.
When asked about his company’s stock, Musk responded: “It’s not worth trying to massage the stock market or manage investor expectations. It’s just. You know? At the end of the day, if you make great cars and the company’s healthy and making great products investors will be happy…If you make lousy products your customers will be unhappy and then your investors will be unhappy.”
Musk then, seemingly unaware that bumpers are falling off of Model 3s as we speak, encouraged entrepreneurs to “focus on the product” when making something new: “My advice, you know, to corporate America or companies worldwide is spend less time on marketing presentations and more time on your product. Honestly that should be the number one thing taught in business schools. Put down that spreadsheet and that PowerPoint presentation and go and make your product better.”
Recall, we have often brought up Musk’s ties to China here on Zero Hedge. We even asked back in April whether or not Musk risks becoming a Chinese asset. The automaker’s quick move to Shanghai and willingness to cozy up to the Chinese government has certainly raised some interest amidst skeptics and short sellers.
Regardless, we have a couple questions for Uncle Sam: why sit idly by and allow this public company CEO to not only spit in the SEC’s face by committing securities fraud and telling them to s*ck his c*** – but also rip off the American taxpayer at the same time. At what point does enough become enough?
Move to China then you twat https://t.co/4PaWqWG9Ha
— Quoth the Raven (@QTRResearch) July 31, 2020