Elon Musk is Donald Trump's pick to lead government efficiency — his billions prove he is qualified

Following his monumental win, President-elect Donald Trump announced that he had a new job for the richest person in the world. Trump selected Elon Musk to lead the newly created “department of government efficiency”. While it is not a government agency, Trump said in a statement that it would shock the government systems, as per The Guardian. 

Trump stated that Musk's role will be to advise on government cost-cutting, slashing "excess regulations" and "cut wasteful" spending. However, critics have warned that Musk could use his powers to benefit his companies as his decisions could influence the US government to provide them value. With or without the influence, Musk seems to be doing great in his endeavors, becoming one of the richest people in history.

Elon Musk has an estimated net worth of $474 billion as of December 26, according to Bloomberg’s Billionaire Index. 

Musk holds the record for being the richest person in modern history. He has built most of his wealth as the CEO of EV maker Tesla Motors. He is also the founder/co-founder of several other companies including SpaceX, Neuralink, and SolarCity. He owns X, formerly Twitter, as well. 

Musk owns about 21% of Tesla and since its October 18 earnings call, the company’s stock spiraled 23%, shaving $189 billion off its market capitalization and $41 billion off Musk’s net worth, as per Fortune. Before the earnings call, Musk had a net worth of $234 billion, as per Bloomberg.

Additionally, Twitter (now X), which was bought by Musk for $44 billion last October, has lost about $25 billion in value, based on an internal valuation by X, Fortune reported. On the other hand, Forbes puts Musk’s net worth at $220 billion as of November 2, and he remains the richest person in the world according to both publications.

Musk has co-founded six companies, including Tesla, SpaceX, and tunneling start-up Boring Company. His entrepreneurial career started with the platform called Zip2, created in 1995. He sold it four years later for over $300 million and then started X.com, an online payment system. He then merged it with what eventually became PayPal, the payment platform which was ultimately sold to eBay for $1.5 billion in 2002.

He then founded SpaceX, a privately held rocket company that has contracts with NASA to take the space shuttle's role of resupplying the International Space Station.

He then took over Tesla around 2004, and it produced the world's first all-electric, zero-emission sports car in 2010. The same year it went public. Tesla became the world's most valuable carmaker in 2020 and its skyrocketing success helped Musk become the world's richest person in 2021.

His third company was SolarCity, a provider of solar power systems. He currently serves as the chairman of the company. He also founded Neuralink, a neurotechnology company that is developing implantable brain-computer interfaces.

In 2022, Musk bought Twitter Inc. for $44 billion after acquiring a stake in the social-media firm. He renamed the company X Corp. in April 2023. Musk owns about 21% of Tesla between stock and options and takes no salary as the CEO of Tesla. However, he had a highly unusual and extremely lucrative bonus plan tied to the company's market cap milestones.

Further, SpaceX is worth nearly $150 billion, according to Forbes. After it bagged a $750 million tender in 2023, the company’s value increased nearly five folds. The Boring Company, which aims to defeat traffic by creating underground tunnels, raised $675 million in 2022 at a $5.7 billion valuation, per the company’s website.