r/AlternateHistoryHub • u/ThatPatelGuy • 1d ago
AlternateHistoryHub What if we confiscated all of Elon Musk's wealth and gave it to his home country of South Africa?
Major political changes in the United States leads to the passage of extraordinary legislation targeting the concentration of private wealth. The American government successfully seizes the entirety of Elon Musk's personal fortune, including his shares in major companies, investments, and other assets. Rather than distributing the money domestically, the government reaches an international settlement that transfers the net proceeds of the confiscation to South Africa, Musk's country of birth.
The sudden influx of capital presents South Africa with an extraordinary opportunity. The country could use the money to modernize its electricity grid, expand railways and ports, improve water infrastructure, build housing, strengthen public education, and invest in domestic manufacturing.
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u/Historical_Buyer5248 1d ago
The sudden influx of capital presents South Africa with an extraordinary opportunity. The country could use the money to modernize its electricity grid, expand railways and ports, improve water infrastructure, build housing, strengthen public education, and invest in domestic manufacturing.
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u/sovietarmyfan 1d ago
Any African country, really. Always goes into the pockets of the dictators.
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u/wozzy93 1d ago
In other words, some type of corruption involving political leaders. Definitely a surge in exotic cars.
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u/Rabid_Lederhosen 21h ago
To be fair to the leaders of South Africa, they’re not dictators. They are however wildly corrupt, so yeah that money is getting pocketed.
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u/Cuddlyaxe 18h ago
This is unfair, a lot of African countries have decent governance
In South Africa's own neighborhood Botswana does much better
For a pure dictatorship, Rwanda is pretty efficient and competent at spending money
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u/TumblrForNerds 22h ago
Dictator? We have free elections?
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u/CenterCenterPolitik 21h ago
I know, what is he thinking? South Africa doesn’t have a dictator it has free elections and also rampant corruption at all levels of government.
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u/MuffinCautious7054 23h ago
Be realistic bro, it would go on tyrant pockets and wars on domination of weaker african neighbours
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u/Short-Historian-296 23h ago
I've seen dumb posts on this subreddit so much but this one takes the cake.
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u/DeadHeadLibertarian 23h ago
South Africa was given fully built cities and infrastructure and somehow it’s been absolutely destroyed or is in a state of massive disrepair.
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u/Ghett0Chemist 22h ago
Everything in Africa is destroyed or in a constant state of disrepair
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u/Medium_Notice_3512 17h ago
But before the new government came to power in South Africa, there were thriving cities and an economy. But before the new government came to power in South Africa, the country had thriving cities and a prosperous economy this despite sweeping sanctions and a persistent proxy war waged against it by the USSR, Europe, and the United States.
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u/BrilliantThought1728 23h ago
It’s white peoples fault
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u/NewPresWhoDis 19h ago
Found the Ivy League prof
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u/IslandVisual 17h ago
My community college professor was saying the same stuff in class. The class was about precolonization Africa and she spent most of it talking about Jim crow America....
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u/NewPresWhoDis 19h ago
The sudden influx of capital presents South Africa with an extraordinary opportunity. The country could use the money to modernize its electricity grid, expand railways and ports, improve water infrastructure, build housing, strengthen public education, and invest in domestic manufacturing.
This beautiful, poetic level of weapons grade myopic progressive naivete that flies in the face of everything we know and understand about the human condition should hang in the Louvre.
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u/Top-Cupcake4775 22h ago
the difference between Indian and African corruption
two rich young meet while attending college in England and become friends. one is from India, the other from South Africa. they stay in touch and, years later the Indian friend invites his African friend to come vist. when his African friend gets there the Indian guy shows him around his house. it's gorgeous, spacious, elegant - with pools, verandas, gardens and a guest house. the African asks the Indian "how did you afford this? we've only been out of school for less than 10 years." the Indian friend points way off into the distance to a highway still under construction. "you see that highway? 80% of the money to build that highway went into my pocket."
a couple years later the African friend repays the courtesy. his house is even more extravagant - it's basically a modern palace. the Indian says "my friend, I must ask you the same question you asked me: how did you ever afford such a magnificent house?" the African replies "you see that highway up along those line of hills?" "no," says the Indian, "I don't see anything." "exactly. 100% of the money for that project went into my pocket."
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u/SturmGizmo 23h ago
It would go into the pockets of the ruling class and SA would continue to deteriorate. They've proven themselves incapable of governing.
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u/ozneoknarf 23h ago
Then all of the ANC would be getting Lamborghinis and the average South African would never see this money.
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u/No_Wait3261 20h ago
the money
But it isn't money. The vast majority of it is stock in various companies.
So what would happen would be:
- The price of the stocks immediately crash as soon as the transfer occurs. Investors hate uncertainty and Musk is himself a major draw for the companies. And every investor has a pretty good idea what step 2 is and wants to get out before it happens.
- South Africa sells the stocks, all of them, for whatever they can get, further bottoming out the price. It's a fire sale, and the people who buy it up are looking to scavenge carious IP rights and so forth, but the companies are dead.
- What little money the South African government gets from the sale would be pocketed by various officials who are already wealthy. The people of South Africa don't see a dime.
- Whatever scraps of the companies are still exist wind up in the hands of other US billionaires and megacorporations anyway.
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u/1995LexusLS400 22h ago
The sudden influx of capital presents South Africa with an extraordinary opportunity. The country could use the money to modernize its electricity grid, expand railways and ports, improve water infrastructure, build housing, strengthen public education, and invest in domestic manufacturing.
Everyone in the ANC will suddenly have new houses and very expensive cars is what will happen. Not this. They have the ability to do this right now. Lack of money is not the problem going on in South Africa. How the money is being used is.
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u/LeviathansWrath6 1d ago
It doesn't do any of that and the money flows directly into the hands of local elite
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u/Key_Pop_8116 20h ago
A crack head would know how to use this money way better than SA. Just saying...
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u/Yoinkitron5000 1d ago
Gone within minutes and improving absolutely nothing except the bank accounts of corrupt government officials and whoever they need to pay off to keep that money.
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u/No_Adhesiveness_5679 23h ago
most of that "wealth" isn't actually cash, but the sum of the value of all his holdings - including stock (some of which, like TSLA is obscenely overvalued). If you tried to sell it all for liquidity it would probably tank.
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u/nicksuperdx 22h ago
The dictators and warlords are going to be able to buy a new BWM and thats about it
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u/CTR_1852 23h ago
In South Africa before they had dirt roads, they had paved roads. There would be virtually no difference in 5 years.
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u/limitless-440 20h ago
Hahaha, yeah let’s see that play out, because I’d give it 3 weeks and the country would be more broken than it already is. Gold plated AK47s, Nike runners, and meth for everyone, lol
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u/JazzSharksFan54 23h ago
Brother... you don't know South Africa if you think that is what is going to happen. Don't get me wrong... Elon doesn't need that money and it should go elsewhere. But in South Africa, it would just be funnelled to the politicians. The people would never see it.
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u/Tim-5544 23h ago
The current government would squander that money. 5 years afterwards south Africa would no be a wealthier country overall and the people would be no better off
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u/kamill85 23h ago
See Kifness video about SA over the recent years. Spoiler alert, they would steal all that and nothing would improve
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u/Powerful-Holiday-448 14h ago
They already have trillions in resources and its doesn’t change the fact that its an unsafe crime infested shithole.
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u/Agitated_Morning5005 1d ago
The line would go up very fast and then go even lower than it originally was, although a tiny bit slower
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u/SMOK3SCR3EN 19h ago
It would still be a corrupt shit hole and burn thru all that money and help not one person
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u/SMK_12 10h ago
His wealth is mostly imaginary so not much happens. Not like he has a trillion dollars of physical assets.
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u/MonsterMuppet19 9h ago
So many people fail to realize this and it hurts. Almost all of his "wealth" is tied up in stocks. It's not like he has billions upon billions just sitting around in cash. It's the same with most of the other billionaires.
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u/SMK_12 9h ago
Yea, like those billions in wealth is the value of the company.. it’s assets that are productive and doing things not just money sitting in a bank vault.
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u/ThrowawayAICS 12h ago
Well first thing first, you just crashed the global economy which relies on the idea that stocks equals ownership and can't just be taken away at the whim of the government.
Then you realize that shares don't equal money, having shares in Tesla and SpaceX and whatever doesn't provide money for you to spend. They'd have to sell them to spend them. Which would collapse the value and likely cause an economic crash.
But if you could avoid issue 1 and issue 2 and you could convert it into straight cash that would mean sending 5 times the national SA budget into the economy.
Which would cause massive inflation and crash the economy.
So you've crashed the economy at least thrice just with your suggestion.
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u/poganetsuzhasenya 12h ago
They did not have to crash the economy and spend it all at once. They could cover deficits and reduce debt, they could start rebuilding energy grid and do othe infrastructure projects. They could buy foreign vaccines and distribute it for free, they could reduce tax and ease the foreign investment abd you could simply pile it somewhere and enjoy major influx of cash on interest
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u/lxlviperlxl 12h ago
Global economy is crashing because 2 American stocks crashed?
Bigger companies have crashed and the worlds been fine.
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u/Neat_Maintenance_457 20h ago
Massive misappropriation of funds, and every South African wants to be a politician.
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u/ArtPerToken 9h ago
South Africa would go back to being the South Africa of today in about 20-30 years and Elon will once again become a billionaire within 10 years, maybe a trillionaire again in about 20.
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u/ChemistRemote7182 20h ago
Why South Africa? His daddy generated money off their labor, not him.
Use it to pay down the US debt, a trillion will buy us an extra year.
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u/AlexanderCrowely 20h ago
No, it wouldn’t that would just pay off some of the interest.
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u/ChemistRemote7182 20h ago
No, our current interest payments on US debt are in fact just around a trillion per year
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u/LibertyDNP 18h ago
lol most of his NW is in stocks, it’s “paper money”. You clearly don’t understand how the stock market works. It’s not as simple as selling 1T in stocks and get 1T in return. The moment you start selling in size, you're not a price taker anymore, you are the market. The stock price would crash as he sells off.
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u/ChemistRemote7182 18h ago
I actually do understand that, but I was going with OPs prompt which is that it is siezable.
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u/possibly_lost45 22h ago
How about we confiscate all of your wealth and give it to someone poorer than you
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u/Dpek1234 21h ago
No
In that case it may actualy be used for something usefull as it circulates the local economy
Put it in a pile, buy very expensive car or buy a boat
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u/Porkytang244 23h ago
The money owned by one man is now distributed to the nice African billionaires of South Africa.
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u/Bombwriter17 23h ago
Of the trillion only a few dollars would end up being put to use for the people of South Africa, the rest given away to create a few dozen more South African billionaires. Hopefully this act alone could spark a new revolution there.
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u/stdoubtloud 23h ago
South Africa is fucked.
And the reason it is fucked is because the opportunity to rebuild was fully squandered by failing to break the tribal hold on citizens votes. The vast majority of elections are determined by the proportion of the electorate in each of the tribal affiliation rather than policy. That leads to the scum floating to the top, and corruption running rife.
If you gave all of Musk's wealth to South Africa you'd need to also establish an non-government oversight org with an armed enforcement division to ensure that the money went to actually improving life. And who would run such an org? Yeah...
South Africa is fucked.
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u/ToastyBob27 22h ago
Half a bridge would get built and the rest will disappear into the void of corruption and ineptitude of its leaders.
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u/loseniram 22h ago
Well besides the fact that this would extremely piss off the US government. It would not actually usable in any shape or form. His companies are hyper inflated in value and make basically no money in profit relative in value. So South Africa would be stuck with a ton of assets that they can’t sell, can’t passively hold, and would make them enemies of a lot of people.
The modern tech sectors is a massive bubble and doesn’t reflect their actual value in terms of assets and economic potential. This is due to a bunch of factors.
The same goes for the vast majority of the tech billionaires which is why they so desperately jump from trend to trend.
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u/Happy_Ad_7515 21h ago
SA would never use the money in a productive way. thats the sad thing about SA's political class.
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u/Datboy000 20h ago
Honestly they would do worst then he does with it. Right now south Africa is not very stable.
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u/DizzyAstronaut9410 19h ago
South Africa specifically has really done an exceptional job of squandering the existing infrastructure and capital that was left when apartheid ended, and has been in pretty swift overall downtrend since.
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u/Ariston_Sparta 19h ago
What if... our education system taught how to think instead of what to think?
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u/sonofbaal_tbc 19h ago
probably the same thing that happens when we do this to any country, we destabilize their economy, make them dependant upon money grants, and lock them into poverty until they crash or have a revolution and rebuild.
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u/Hopeful_Idea1568 22h ago
Real answer, not reactionary or knee jerk - if they gave it to the current govt, most of it would be mismanaged (inefficient projects) and some would be stolen. They can't steal most of it because there are still laws. There would still be a lot of tangible development but it will feel like there should have been a lot more. Maintenance levels would vary. Daily life would stay the same.
If they gave it to an independent entity that could oversee where it goes and hold people accountable, it would create hundreds of thousands of new jobs supporting a couple of million families. Morale would go up and in some areas crime would drop. GDP would grow and maybe investor confidence too. It would still widen the inequality because only those who already have the means would get tenders and the most skilled would get the best jobs. So if you build a street, the company doing the work and the subcontractors supplying things would get richer and the engineers and management would earn multiples more than the blue collar.
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u/General-Lime4219 16h ago
Giving a shit ton of money to a bunch of corrupt communists sounds like a really dumb thing to do though.
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u/6IXTH 17h ago
Base on google
• Total Official Development Assistance (since 1970): Over $2.6 trillion USD.
• U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) contributions (2001–2024): Provided $131.6 billion USD specifically to African countries for health, humanitarian aid, and development.
With all that money spent and not much have changed. What made you think Elons wealth would make a difference?
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u/Connect-Exchange-615 22h ago
The South Africans would squander it and most likely be worse off than they are now (which is extremely bad off).
Handing out money does not fix things. Look at rich kids who are handed everything. They don’t respect it because it was never theirs nor nor do they take care of it
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u/Lost_Panda1994 21h ago
there is a reason why trillions of dollars from donations barely change africa. No amount of money can change mindset and culture.
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u/Sarazin_Sky 18h ago
Robbing Americans when South African is resource rich? Seems likes a dumb idea - better to redistribute his wealth to the Americans he has robbed
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u/CloseToMyActualName 22h ago
Without the Musk "premium" 90% of the market capitalization goes away.
You've now given South Africa about 10% of their annual GDP, that's nice, but not exactly an "extraordinary opportunity".
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u/Personal-Machine4919 22h ago
South Africa is in the position it's in because it's full of South Africans. No amount of money can fix that. There is no magic soil. Just magic people.
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u/Illustrious-Wave-794 21h ago
Well, his net worth isn’t raw cash for starters. And even if it was, South Africa’s govt is so fuckass corrupt it would all end up in the pockets of the few at the top and no one that actually needs it would see a single dime.
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u/Dpek1234 21h ago
Or the thing that happens almost every time a country gets a massive amount of wealth rather quick
Uses it all and fails when it runs out
Well done Norway to avoid this
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u/666Drachenlord666 21h ago
Its kinda cute thag OP thinks this lop, like a lil kid that believes in the kindness and honesty of people lmao
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u/Mega1987_Ver_OS 20h ago
At the current political setting in south africa.
Nothing changes. Just more guns, more money to the pockets.
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u/OkMention9988 20h ago
It could be used for all the reasons you listed, but judging from it's trajectory since the new ruling class was installed, it won't.
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u/SmootherWorm 20h ago
Sorry, is this car with rocket boosters something Tesla is proposing? Because I have a Tesla and a daytime running light stopped working a month into owning it due to a firmware mismatch, a tire pressure monitor failed in one tire, another didn’t detect a flat, and the e-brakes are notorious for having issues.
So if you think at least one of those boosters won’t fail on most cars, enjoy your ride.
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u/Necessary_Cow_3837 19h ago
There is no fortune. His “wealth” comes from the fictional value of his companies. What we need to do is change the system for retirement. If it were uncoupled from the stock market we could allow businesses to rise and fall. Under the current system of debting our nation to keep stock values artificially inflated we give people like musk all the power in the world.
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u/pink-mallow 19h ago
The money would be gone in a few short years. South African government is corrupt and bad. Apartheid was bad but the issues they face now are from a terribly shit government.
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u/Forced_Registration1 18h ago
SA is crazy corrupt, they'd piss it away. If we gave it to the government.
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u/KangarooInevitable70 18h ago
A small number of people would become even more insanely rich vs the rest of the nation.
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u/ThePlatinumPaul 17h ago
South Africa changes its name to Wakanda, creates a AI created video showing what it will look like in 5 years, and aside from all the politicians wearing solid gold suits literally nothing changes. In fact in 5 years it's worse.
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u/TurbulentWinters 17h ago
The South African government couldn’t handle that wealth, it would all be gone and the country would be no better off than it is today. Corruption runs through it like wild fire
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u/Full_glass3334 16h ago
Nothing. South africa has a wealth distribution problem, not a wealth size problem
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u/Icehokeytypekda 15h ago
Unfortunately, those in power, and their entrenched networks along all societal lines and power structures would just siphon it to their personal benefaction at the end of the day. It will not make a better, society / state / country and will not improve the lives of the average citizen.
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u/AwkwardCost1764 14h ago
Long term? This would be a disaster. It would drive corruption and overspending. The average citizen probably wouldn’t notice.
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u/ll123412341234 14h ago
They already don’t maintain anything. What makes you think that they will even bother to build something unless they can steal 90% of the money first.
Watch Empire Of Dirt to understand Africa more.
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u/a_Bean_soup 14h ago
Did John Government Fund Embezzlement write this?.
also his liquid wealth is 850 million, which is 0.51% of South Africa's annual budget
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u/Direct_Substance8317 13h ago
People will have caviar, Johnny Walker black and Range Rovers and the remaining 99.9999% of the population will get nothing.
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u/Awkward-Soup-461 13h ago
If you somehow manage to convert his net worth into pure currency then yes. If you just confiscate it and try to sell it or do something with it then it would just loose most of it’s value and you will get like 50 billion, which then will most likely be mismanaged.
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u/Atlatica 13h ago
Elon's wealth is ownership shares of SpaceX and Tesla. That is taking the current price of 1 share of those companies and multiplying that by his number of shares.
If you try to force a sell off of those shares the value of each one would drop to a fraction of what it is now. If you tried to transfer them to the south African government so they own SpaceX and TSLA I think there'd also be an immediate sell off from every other investor.
And even if you somehow found a way to get the entire 1T over to South Africa, you'll pay for about 6 years of government spending. Which wouldn't be nothing at all, definitely a major boost for the country. But it wouldn't turn into Wakanda.
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u/OkDifficulty7436 1d ago
The ANC would be buying a lot of homes in Dubai, Shanghai, Switzerland, etc if that happened lmao