I disagree. There a people who are nice and there are people who get capital and talent together to build new technology that makes per person productivity increase tremendously.
With Elon, he brought to cost of sending payloads into space down by a factor of more than 10.
With electric cars, he made them economically viable that many others had failed to do before. Tesla is an incredibly human efficient company compared to its competitors Ford and GM.
Same with Gates, Bezos and Steve Jobs, they got people and capital organize to boost the productivity per person working for them and people using their output (software and devices)
Good technology amplifies per person productivity.
We may hate the personality and character, but what’s worth looking at is what would be the world be like if there was no Tesla, Amazon, SpaceX or Microsoft?
>Did the likes of musk or bezos add billions of dollars in value to the economy though their own hard work?
If building Amazon, Tesla or spaceX is that easy, where is your company that changed the entire industry? What did you accomplish so far? You may not like the way they comment on social media, but they have tangible results to back up their reputation. Unlike other types of "celebrities", they actually built tangible things that most people would consider good even if they hate the face of the owner (eg. reusable rockets, electric cars, Amazon delivery, AWS, etc.).
I've designed a bunch of medical devices that have done real good in the world. I'm working to design more as we speak. Are rockets and luxury cars more important than medical care?
They did build some companies and they deserve the rewards for doing so. What they didn't do is add so much value to humanity's productivity to justify rewards in the $10^11 range.
The likes of buffet and the other 3,000 or so billionaires who choose to live quieter, less Gatsby lifestyle are better role models IMO.