[abakker]

Evidence that Musk has not "the faintest grasp of economics"? I'm not sure that you can make that claim about anyone who has a company that they created that is worth >$1bn.

Also, as long as people don't reject Flat-earth, climate-denial, or intelligent design, they are condoning those things. The Republican party have been masters of allowing these beliefs to come along for the ride for years. 2 of them seem to be rooted in religious freedom, and can be safely left out of political discourse. the 3rd, climate change denial, needs to be discussed, and needs to be handled on the basis of facts instead of beliefs.

[jredwards]

Handling the economics of a nation is dramatically different from running a business, no matter how many presidential hopefuls claim otherwise.

[trendia]

I always hear that businessmen would do a poor job with the country's budget, but the politicians don't seem to be doing a fine job, either.

[cmdrfred]

When you look back though the past few decades or so of political history really only two options exist. The politicians we have elected were utterly incompetent (based on campaign promises vs what was achieved) or they achieved the goals that were the most important to them. I believe it is the second option, they care little about a balanced budget and a great deal about enriching the donor class.

[edblarney]

Basically nobody believes in 'Flat Earth' it's ridiculous that you'd put that in there.

And it's surprising how many CEO's in tech don't have a grasp of economics.

Elon doesn't know what the Fed's QE program does or what it means.

Watch investors speak about what they think of the future, and of business, then watch Elon, Zuck etc. speak. There's a marked difference. The investors are economically literate, and usually speak in those terms. Founder don't.

Elon is in 2 business that are fundamentally affected by things like currency, interest rates, consumer credit - Solar City and Tesla. And he never - ever - talks about it.

Most engineers are financially and especially economically illiterate.

But I don't think you actually need to understand econ really well to be a CEO or a good entrepreneur, I just think it's really weird that they don't.

[nostrademons]

You're describing the difference between macroeconomics and microeconomics. Pretty much every successful entrepreneur I know has a very solid grasp of microeconomics, oftentimes much more solid than most economists or financiers. They don't always have a detailed understanding of macroeconomics, and many of them don't need one to run their businesses.

When you can steal market share from existing incumbents, oftentimes with a 10x better product value proposition, then currency, interest rates, and consumer credit are rounding error. They don't matter - you have a potential market that is many times greater than the current size of your company, so you just convince your competitors' customers to switch to you and you get growth even if the economy as a whole is contracting. But on a macro-level, this is zero-sum, because your gain is your competitor's loss. On a macro-level, the only things that lead to everyone's gain are improvements in productivity and better use of unemployed resources.

Now, when it comes to the original thread subject, this is very relevant: it's worrisome that Trump seems to be treating the U.S. economy as a whole the way you would treat a business, and is applying microeconomics tools in a situation subject to macroeconomics. But it's not true that Elon, Zuck, etc. don't understand economics; rather, they understand economics, but the part of it that is relevant to their daily lives is different from the part that pundits and economists care about.

[edblarney]

"When you can steal market share from existing incumbents, oftentimes with a 10x better product value proposition, then currency, interest rates, and consumer credit are rounding error."

Tesla does not have a product that is fundamentally superior to anything.

Regular car companies releasing amazing electric cars that are now 'long range' and for 1/2 the price.

Tesla's nice display and 'danger modes' are a gimmick.

They are running out of competitive advantage very quickly.

And they are missing production milestones.