Sure but look at the growth in vehicle Tesla just needs to catch up to VW Group. 18 times the current Tesla size. So to see Tesla get there and STILL have a 30x multiple on that to justify it currents P/E is just crazy especially when Tesla is losing market share to all the new EV's.

I don't think risk based new CEO need tears.

But also the approximately 1 in 10 that make it through and actually start making a good profit should not be demonized nor should people act like the workers deserve a share of the profits beyond what the owner voluntarily shares.

If the wage based workers want and demand their salary (and they do) even as the company is struggling, and if when it fails they don't give any of that money back, then they have no right to profits on the other end when it succeeds.

You are either in the 'risk equation' on both ends or you are not. And most wage based earners want no part, NONE, of the risk equation. Most won't even take partial cash salary with the enticement of stock that would be worth much more, in a win, if offered that to help the company with cash flow. Most want their full market rate in cash wage NOW or they will go somewhere else where they can get it. And that is fine, but again then don't pretend they deserve any of the reward that came with avoiding all the risk.

I agree with this - I think tesla is priced too high.

To summarize what has been going on lately, the Hertz purchase was a big deal. It will incentivize other rentals companies to adopt EV and also allows the govt to press forward on stricter emissions.

You are correct that Tesla is losing market share to other EVs but the crux of this is that all EV car companies are gaining - look at ford and gm stock as well, and that the product that's worth the money in the future is that it's 2021 and still over half the vehicles on the road are internal combustion engines.

What in gods name am I reading.

Yup, the EV market will be a huge winner and so will Tesla within it. Arguably the biggest winner within it as the premier brand with fiercely loyal customers.

But the other automakers are going to flood the market with hundreds of Ev's also taking share such that the EV pie will be cut in to Dozen shares or more. So even having the biggest share does not mean Tesla can outsell and out grow multiples of the other top competitors combined.

The reality many hate on the left.

Believe it or not most new Companies that seek investor cash would instead be thrilled if most of the wage workforce would take only a percent of their cash salary and the rest in stock so the company's owners did not have to use the cash for wages and instead could use it to get profitable with growth.

If the employees did that, they then would automatically share in the profits, as owners as well, but almost no employees want any part of that equation. They want 100% of the wage they can commend in the market up front or they will take their labour elsewhere. And that is fine.

But then don't demand or expect a share of the profits later if this company happens to be one that makes big beyond what the owners want to share.

You understand the workers lose their livelihood if the company goes tits up, right? That’s quite a lot of financial risk for them!

No one wants to be paid in stock for the company they work for. Any financial professional will tell you that’s a dumb idea.

Trolleycar, I think you have misunderstood. Sure, one can lose a job if a co goes belly up but.....

Ive owned businesses since 1980. No employee has EVER wanted a share of profits at the end of the year if it meant they had to "give back" $X in a loss year.

sample size.... I know.


and really, stock options are a thing

It only a risk in that they might not immediately get another wage job.

I've been part of companies that as they were shutting the doors their HR worked with and helped get every single wage employee hired by other competitor firms and they started at the new jobs on Day 1 after the doors shut.

So what did the employee in that case?


But yes an employee is selling their labour and if the business goes bust that specific employer will not be paying them for something they are no longer giving them.

You are absolutely 100% wrong on this.

Every entrepreneur type is happy to have this equation.

When doing a startup you seek as many of these entrepreneur types as possible for the top roles (CFO, COO, etc) who will take a partial wage that is less than market while taking the balance in a multiple of stock.

Meaning if they could command $100k/yr they will instead take $50k or $75K/yr with the remaining $50k or $25k paid in twice or three times as much stock so if the company they joined wins, they win big as now minority 'earn in' shareholders.

The concept of Earn In or Sweat Equity is not a new one.


No you are conflating two different things.

You should not take your after tax dollars and buy your own company stock. Diversify is generally more sound.

You would not get any Financial Professional advising you not to join a Start up where you might accept some sweat equity in loo of a full salary. That would be up to you and your risk profile.


Every startup I have been a part of starts out with a number of key executives who are sought out as they are the entrepreneurial type and will take the stock instead of some portion of cash. The cash savings on those bigger initial salaries allows you to raise less capital and/or pay more wage earners and other bills where you get no such compromise.

I have a very good friend w/ Harvard MBA and great track record; he's kinda a quasi-VC guy, kinda a stud-4-hire. Works to get companies off the ground for no... or little.... pay. Plenty of company stock tho. Bottom line....he's more than financially comfortable with several duds in the portfolio.

At the moment it's pretty easy to walk across the street and find another job. Not a lot of risk unless you are completely incompetent and working for a family member.

It's high risk, but not necessarily dumb depending on your position in life and the prospects of the company.

And that is exactly the equation those who demonize CEO's and companies when they are profitable, never want to consider.

The minute a risk/reward scenario is presented most wage earners say 'nope, no way. Just give me my full hourly market rate as I want no part of that downside risk'. But then as soon as the company is very profitable there are those who say 'no fair that the Owners keep all the profits as they are exploiting the employees by only giving them their market rate wage and not a share of the profit'.

They want the employees to have their cake and eat it too.


And stock option plans (eSOP's) are a different thing as they are almost 100% used as bonus incentive and pose no risk to the employee who still gets full market wage.

And make no mistake as I am all for eSOP as well as voluntary Profit sharing between companies and employees and always advocate for it. I am just against any suggestion of entitlement for it, or demonization of the Owners who do not do it.

Exactly. If we are talking small retail businesses or restaurants no employee is going to want to take on risk. At the same time not many owners are going to offer employees upside.

Stock options are definitely a thing. They just apply to a relatively small subset of companies.

I assume we’re talking about salaried workers who need to worry about things like rent and groceries.

I've been doing the same for (without his bonafides) for over 20 years now.

I've joined many companies in various capacities for a very small wage (usually to cover my out of pocket) while taking the offset in stock at a multiple to what they would have to pay me in cash.

I've worked with 2 and 3 start ups sometimes at a time, launching in various capacities (usually Operations) as they try to get off the ground with limited cash, if I think they have a good concept.

I have a handful of other exec's in my rolodex who will do the same and who I can bring to the table for the company, again to save cash. We refer to our group 'Parachute management'.

It is basically like the company is raising money without having to raise money as we are using our 'otherwise' salary to buy their stock. Or if instead they got an investor they would be paying it to us, now they get to keep it and use it for other growth.

I've been a Founder in 3 companies but 'earned in' on 4 other companies I had no role in starting by trading wage for stock.

You lose on more than you win in this equation but one big winner can pay exponentially higher than any salary would have. So you are gambling on that risk reward equation. Some are willing to. Most employees are not. In my experience it is less than 1% who want that risk. Way less.

If you work at Citibank and have Citibank Stock options you should not also be trading off your salary for more Citi stock.

I think that is what Trolly is confusing. Don't triple down with all eggs in that one basket.


However if are in a position (ex' young single person) who has built up a good skill set (Accountant/CFO) and you have a choice of two jobs:

- job one with Family Accounting firm that manages the books of companies in their community and is offering you a market rate of $150k/yr

- job 2 is a tech start up that looks very promising. They can offer you $100k/yr but their last cash raise saw them sell their stock for $1/sh and they are willing to make up the lost $50k in salary for you by giving you instead an equivalent of $100k in stock (company still private so you cannot sell it)


No Financial Adviser would advise this person not to take this as a bad decision.

this person is just choosing to go the minority owner route (Earn In) for less cash.

Nothing you are describing is particularly novel. In a lot of start up industries (biotech one I"m familiar with) it is super super ****ing common to have equity as part of the compensation package, most commonly in the form of options. So I don't really get why you are so incredulous about this common thing you yourself are familiar with is a thing:
The big catch is that it depends on the industry. In your example:
a 150k/year job IS the type of job where in more startup industries you will see instead a lot of option packages mixed in, maybe not quite as extreme as this. But for the large majority of lower end jobs, that isn't accessible to them as a way to share in profits. And increasing their variance when living pay-check to pay-check isn't really viable.

its not an effort by the left. its exploitive by its very nature.

You act like I was not replying to Trolly who does not think this dynamic exists.

You and i agree it is common. Stop trying to pick fights where we don't have any.

However do not conflate Stock Options with Sweat Equity or Earn In's. They both generally serve different purposes.

For instance everyone at Google gets stock options even though they all get FULL market pay. Only a few at Founding would have Sweat Equity. One is typically a bonus (eSOP) whereas the other is usually a way to make up the compensation package for someone a young company would like to hire but could not afford to pay fully as they need to keep their cash for other purposes.

I helped raise $10's of millions for early stage companies as well as being willing to work for early stage companies and earn Sweat Equity. They often struggle to hire the type of strong resume staff they need to raise money as investors do not typically want to see all the money going out in to salaries instead of building out the product or service.

So by being able to entice someone with a good resume who could more cash elsewhere with Sweat Equity is a common strategy.

Sweat Equity to offset reduced pay

Does that mean it is bad?

For instance in University I started a Window Washing company to create my own summer job.

I took some of my savings and bought all the equipment needed and spent money on printing flyers and mailing them out, along with going door to door knocking and dropping them in mailboxes. It cost me a few thousand dollars to get it going.

It was $20/man hour to get the work done.

I immediately got a lot of work and hired one other student to work with me and paid him $10. So every job we were on I made $30/hr and he made $10/hr. $10/hr was a good wage for a student in that time frame.

I was turning away jobs within a few weeks as we could not take it all on and we were working 7 days a week usually from dawn until dusk.

So then I got the guy I hired a used car (I got a gov't loan/grant for $5K from their "Student Business Program') and bought more equipment and hired two more students at $10/hr each.

One worked with me and the other worked with him. I moved his pay up to $20/hr as my Supervisor and i made $40/hr and the two new guys made $10ea/hr.

Is that exploitive to the other students? If you say yes is it 'bad', 'wrong' and something that should not happen, that I created those jobs and got the work and shared it with them?

By the time you factored out my costs I made about $25/hr as an average for the summer. I was very happy as i had typically had kitchen jobs (short order cook) that i would take in the summers or work part time which paid $7-9/hr back then.

The commies just put you on their guillotine list.

I think it is pretty clear with this and his prior statement Elon is trying to soften up his supporters to the idea that the Hertz deal might not get closed but also it should not matter and his stock should not come down as a result.



He knows it got a big pop up due to that announcement and does not want to lose that air and see it deflate if the deal collapses.

He would pay the six billion even if the "proof" fell slightly short in order to avoid bad publicity. But his public offer is dumb because it can cause him a big problem. First because he seems to be admitting that there actually is a number that could put a big dent in world hunger for quite a while. Its just that he is sure that it is a lot more than six billion.

Except that if economists show that it is more like 35 billion, he is supposed to still pay it! If it actually came to this I am sure he would persuade other multi billionaires to chip in. But even if he couldn't, he could pay it all with virtually no personal adverse effects. The only reason not to would entail Ayn Rand/Toothsayer type arguments and he explicitly rejected them when he said he would pay the six bil.

Musk's net worth is down more than $40 billion in the last 2 days.

Good thing you guys haven't already spent his tax money, because he'd be due for a big ol' refund.

Is anyone here advocating for a rolling tax on his stock holdings as the price fluctuate as I certainly am not?

Or is this you saying you have no valid point and thus must try to make one on a strawman?

What I do think is very doable is require the money he takes as Loans but is in fact his income and tax it as income. A simply change in the definition of Income to include language that says 'all forms of income must be declared as such' would suffice and then let the IRS do their thing.