Elon Musk is the world’s richest human being. According to Forbes, which ranked the entrepreneur as the number one billionaire in the world, Musk’s net worth is in the range of $773.5 billion. That’s a lot of money for one person. But what if Musk shared the wealth and agreed to fund the United States’ retirement system-who would get how much?
GOBankingRates set out to answer the question about how many Americans could retire comfortably with Elon Musk’s net worth. Let’s find out.
After Taxes
The first thing Bryan Ward, the managing partner at ProCore Advisors, would want to take into account is that the majority of Elon Musk’s wealth exists on paper, primarily tied to his shares in Tesla, X, and SpaceX.
“But let’s say he were to liquidate it all,” said Ward. “You still have the issue of capital gains taxes. That would knock the net worth down to roughly $400 billion.”
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Gifting Wealth
Alternatively, Ward outlined that Musk could gift every citizen partial shares of his companies and not actually recognize the tax himself. Ward went on to say that this method would not prevent the stock from plummeting if he were to sell all his shares at once.
Under the assumption that Musk decides to gift it evenly to all legal U.S. citizens, or roughly 300 million, Ward estimated that that would be $2,578.33 per individual.
“So, as we can see, unless you are already comfortably retired or already in a position to comfortably retire, this amount is not significant enough for really anyone over the age of 20,” Ward said.
Using Shares
Ward offered another alternative route: that a gift of Musk shares in this same amount could have potential for substantial growth for those under the age of ten.
“Assuming a slightly higher than average growth rate of 11% annually, because it is SpaceX, and a retirement age of 70,” Ward said. “This could equate to around $900 thousand for a ten-year-old today, while a one-year-old receiving the shares today could see those shares grow to over $2.4 million by the time they retire.”
Ward pointed out how this example just illustrates the benefits of investing early and the power of compounding. “This also supports the initiative of the government funding $1,000 into what they will deem the ‘Trump Account’ for any child with an eligible Social Security card between January of 2025 and December of 2028,” said Ward.
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This article originally appeared on GOBankingRates.com: Here’s How Many Americans Could Retire Comfortably With Elon Musk’s Net Worth
