There's a pattern of behavior. Across disparate entities, which you wouldn't expect, but they all have the same CEO, and have occurred over a period of several years, so it's definitely maybe sort of for sure worth pillorying him over.
SpaceX’s Starlink is the only subscription I have that keeps billing me less and less over time. 100 > 80 > 65 > 50. This is over ~2 years. They don’t even make a fuss about it. I just see it on my credit card statements.
So my take is that SpaceX stock as compensation can have zero value and should be treated as such... I hope they are outright honest about this when recruiting. Reminding everyone that we can steal all this compensation at any moment.
> So my take is that SpaceX stock as compensation can have zero value and should be treated as such..
Correct.
I remain astounded by people who consider stock based compensation on non-public companies (and in this case a company who's CEO has explicitly railed against companies being publicly traded), especially given these terms seem to actively prevent employees alone from selling shares during funding rounds and similar (from the article it sounds like the only groups who can profit from share sales are spacex itself - ideally the point of funding - musk, and presumably his selected cronies).
If a company say's "we'll give you a stock grant" but isn't willing to just pay you the equivalent value at each vesting point then their intent is to screw you over, and negotiating like there's any good faith on their side is stupid.
Well no, you still have to pay taxes on the stock when it vests, usually stock compensation is handled by a fraction of the stock being sold upon vesting to cover those taxes but I'm not sure how that works when you can't sell the stock yourself and spacex gets to invent the value those shares have when they're granted.
If a company wants to have stock based compensation, the company needs to allow employees to get priority in exchanging stock during funding rounds or "tenders" (I guess that what they're called at spacex scale), or it needs to be public. The idea that you can pay someone in an asset but then turn around and say "actually you don't own that asset" is absurd, but tracks with Elon's general view that employees don't deserve compensation or basic employment rights.
To some level, isn’t this an effective way to keep employees focused on the mission? The second you get a big payday you reconsider the need to work full time, the importance of family, health. You might even quit and start a new company with your pile of cash. All of which are not good for spaceX.
No secret working at any of his companies is a bad financial deal for any employee. The best thing you get out of it is the lift on your resume, which you can later on leverage into a stable, better paid role in a company not run by a madman.
Corrosive culture ultimately undoes a business when it encounters hard times. Musk appears to have lacked honorable and decent business leader role models on how to transition from initial startup success to an enduring business that can retain good talent long-term.
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[ 4.3 ms ] story [ 67.0 ms ] threadIt's like saying "definitely probably."
Correct.
I remain astounded by people who consider stock based compensation on non-public companies (and in this case a company who's CEO has explicitly railed against companies being publicly traded), especially given these terms seem to actively prevent employees alone from selling shares during funding rounds and similar (from the article it sounds like the only groups who can profit from share sales are spacex itself - ideally the point of funding - musk, and presumably his selected cronies).
If a company say's "we'll give you a stock grant" but isn't willing to just pay you the equivalent value at each vesting point then their intent is to screw you over, and negotiating like there's any good faith on their side is stupid.
If a company wants to have stock based compensation, the company needs to allow employees to get priority in exchanging stock during funding rounds or "tenders" (I guess that what they're called at spacex scale), or it needs to be public. The idea that you can pay someone in an asset but then turn around and say "actually you don't own that asset" is absurd, but tracks with Elon's general view that employees don't deserve compensation or basic employment rights.