Rajkot updates news Elon musk pays 11 billion in taxes. What does this tell us about the billionaire? How does it impact his company? And what does the $11 billion go towards? We have answers to these questions and more. Knowledge is power, but money is even more so. If you have enough of it, you can access just about anything you want: insider information, privileged documents, exclusive events, or even a person’s time and attention. Money buys influence and power—which is why some people are willing to pay so much of it just to stay out of jail.
That’s exactly what Elon Musk appears to be doing. The Tesla CEO has given away almost nothing of his personal fortune since 2013 (except for when he bought a small fizzy-water company called Fiji Water last year). Instead, he’s been depositing the vast majority of that money into trusts for his own kids, which ensures that they inherit it all tax-free when he dies.
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Rajkot updates news Elon musk pays 11 billion in taxes: What Does It Go Towards?
There are a lot of conspiracy theories regarding Elon Musk and taxes. But the truth is more prosaic. Musk simply made a ton of money and got a lot of tax breaks along the way. At the moment, Musk has a net worth of $19.2 billion. That’s a cumulative total, which means he had to make a lot of money very quickly to get there. However, Musk’s earnings were not tax free. Most of the $11 billion in taxes that Musk paid went towards his gargantuan earnings from the year 2000. That year, Musk made $150 million from the sale of PayPal (which he co-founded in 1998). He also made another $70 million from the sale of his share of the Click Network. But those earnings weren’t taxed at the time thanks to an IRS rule that allowed him to defer that tax burden until after he retired.
Elon Musk & Taxes: What We Know
The first thing to understand is that, while Elon Musk has a lot of money to pay taxes with, he doesn’t actually have to pay $11 billion. The IRS is a government agency that taxes its citizens based on their annual income and earnings. And Musk doesn’t owe $11 billion in taxes to the government. He owes that money to himself. If Musk simply holds onto all of his money until he dies, he won’t have to pay any taxes on that money. That’s because inheritance taxes only apply to your immediate family (spouses, kids, parents). The rest of your money goes to the government and is used to fund things like schools and infrastructure. However, if Musk starts spending his money before he dies, he has to pay taxes on it.
How Much Is $11B?
Since we can’t put a price on a human life, it’s hard to say how much $11 billion actually means. However, the number does give us a basic idea of how much money Musk has. At the moment, Musk has a net worth of $19.2 billion. However, that’s a cumulative total, which means that he had to make a lot of money very quickly to get there. The $11 billion in taxes that Musk paid last year only makes up around 25% of his total earnings since 2000.
Where Did The $11B Come From?
Musk’s $11 billion in taxes come from the sale of PayPal in 2002. In 1998, Musk co-founded PayPal as an online payments system. PayPal allowed people to send money to each other through their computers, which was a huge deal at the time: the internet was still in its early stages, and online financial transactions didn’t exist yet. In 2002, eBay bought PayPal for $1.5 billion—which was a pretty good return on investment for Musk, who owned around 25% of the company’s shares.
However, Musk made a lot more money than just the $75 million he made from the sale of his shares. The IRS allows people to defer taxes on their earnings from the sale of stocks and shares until after they retire. That means that, for the last 15 years, Musk has been depositing $11 billion into a savings account. Once he retires, he has to pay that money back to the government with interest.
What Will The Money Be Used For?
Musk has been under a lot of pressure in recent years. He’s dealing with production issues at his Tesla factories and has come under fire for his erratic behavior. And he’s also been dealing with a divorce from his second wife, actress Amber Heard, which has been rather public and messy. That’s why Musk has been setting up trusts for his own kids. By putting most of his post-2000 earnings into trusts for his own kids, Musk can ensure that his children will inherit all that money tax-free when he dies. And by doing that, Musk also protects his kids from his own mismanagement.
There’s no telling what will happen to Musk in the next few years. He might continue to be at his best, or he might lose focus and get into trouble. But no matter what happens, his children will have a nice chunk of money waiting for them—and they won’t have to worry about losing it because they can’t manage their finances.
Final Thoughts
Elon Musk has made a lot of mistakes in his life: he’s divorced twice and has been criticized for his erratic behavior. But he’s also shown a lot of wisdom: he has forged new paths in the industries of space travel, engineering, and auto manufacturing. To top that off, Musk has also been incredibly careful with his money—which is why he’s the richest person in the entire world. It’s unlikely that Musk will actually spend all of his money before he dies. Instead, he made sure that he had a nest egg for his own family—just in case. And, if Musk does die with a ton of money in the bank, at least he’ll have done something good with it: he’ll have given the government a huge chunk of the country’s budget.