[8f2ab37a-ed6c]

Not that Elon Musk doesn't have plenty of flaws that people online will be happy to spill much ink about, but what does that have to do with widespread poverty on a national level?

Does the US not have a government and state-level and federal-level representatives whose job it is to take care of their citizens and keep them out of starvation? Elon Musk and his pals seem like a convenient distraction from holding accountable people whose job it is to protect their constituents.

[brundolf]

Many of those wealthy individuals (or their companies, at least) have lobbied to ensure that we don't have a government which takes upon itself to keep citizens out of starvation. Not sure about Elon Musk specifically, but politicians don't just magically decide to ignore the needs of their constituents.

[et-al]

To spell it out for those in the back: reducing tax rates reduces the government's ability to fund public projects. i.e. roads, schools, and safety nets like food banks.

Also, the responsibility of feeding children has fallen upon schools in some areas. When SF closed schools in March 2020, one of the issues they had to address was "how do we feed the kids?"

https://www.sfusd.edu/about/news/current-news/sfusd-provide-...

[AnimalMuppet]

Politicians magically decide to ignore the needs of their constituents whenever they think they can get away with it, unless they're saints - and not many saints are politicians.

The better question might be, why do they think they can get away with it? Why do they get away with it?

(By the way, note that this is not just a problem with one party...)

[brundolf]

Whenever they can get away with it and it's in their best interest (thanks to lobbyists). If they don't get anything out of it, they may as well take the free goodwill from voters.

[AnimalMuppet]

Yeah, maybe I'm too cynical, but I suspect that there's always some lobbyists willing to make it worth any politician's time to do what's not in the voters' interest.

[owenmarshall]

> Does the US not have a government and state-level and federal-level representatives whose job it is to take care of their citizens and keep them out of starvation?

It’s patently obvious that no, the US does not.

[JoshTko]

Agree it's unfair to single out Elon. But Elon has clearly been anti-union for a long while and has building factories in states with low union presence. He's undoubtedly contributing to income inequality via corporate policies.

The cumulative pressure by major companies on congress is probably the single main reason why congress does not enact stronger protection. We got corporate tax cuts because of this over say better employment protection laws.

Disclosure: am a Tesla stockholder.

[tempsy]

Agree that blaming individuals makes no sense. It's the system that is pushing the poorest into more debt and insecurity while making the rich richer that is the problem.

A lot of talk about building a healthy middle class but we've lost track of that goal decades ago.

[staplers]

Except those people heavily dictate how the system operates. "Systems" don't just operate without human input or decision-making.

[schwartzworld]

No. We have representatives whose job it is to serve their campaign donors. Musk is a leech, but someone with that much money has political influence.

[mempko]

Because money is power and it's clear people like Musk have a bigger responsibility to push for an accountable government.

[SpicyLemonZest]

Are you sure? I like Elon Musk quite a bit, and even I don't think he should go around telling politicians what to do. That's not what we as a society have businesspeople for.

[mempko]

I agree with you. However, there is the world we want and the world we live in. Until we have an actual democracy (which likely won't have billionaires, look into what happens in popular movements in the past) then Musk has an outside responsibility to society because he has outsized power.