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Comment by mikec3010 | Hacker News Reader

Here are some moral judgements against Elon:

* shopped around US cities to bargain for the most corporate welfare tax breaks for his gigafactory, effectively shoveling the taxburden onto the residents.

* promised so many new jobs to Reno for the gigafactory, but most of the construction contracts were given to out of state construction firms.

* uses "third party" contractor loopholes to separate workers from the company so they can be easily over worked (12 hour shifts) then discarded

* same is true for the tesla factory in CA.

* overworks the engineers at SpaceX and throws them away if they don't work 7 days a week.

* started paypal, whose profits derive from circumventing banking laws by claiming not to be a bank, whose reputation for stealing/freezing money is unsurpassed by anyone except criminal enterprise.

So I'm sorry bud. I don't have any sympathy because some guy copied your files. In fact this is likely just a publicity stunt.

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If the moral system which you currently subscribe to is such that it is morally okay and perhaps even virtuous to demand that people who have voluntarily chosen to work together at higher level of work ethic should all be forced to lower their standards to be in accordance with your personal beliefs, then this moral judgement is valid. But you should seriously consider questioning that belief. People who voluntarily choose to work insane hours in Elon's companies are contributing an insane amount of value to this world and I for one am grateful for their sacrifices and contributions.

Framing this as though employees have total freedom and choice wrt employer and working hours is plain incorrect. Those engineers at SpaceX aren't organized, thus they get screwed out of overtime and can't talk about the houra and working conditions they are pressured to labor under.

They’re extremely intelligent and hardworking engineers; they can just get a job somewhere else.

I'm one of those SpaceX engineers, and I do feel that I have almost complete freedom to get another job at any time if I didn't want to work here or was unhappy about compensation. Your assumptions are wrong. There's no scandal about the working conditions at SpaceX. Me and every SpaceX engineer I know are happy. Move on.

Keep tellin' yourself that

I agree with the things you've listed being morally wrong or at least grey area. A 'nice' person wouldn't necessarily do those things. eg. if Tesla's motto was 'be nice' then these things would make them hypocritical.

However, none of those things you've listed above are illegal. Corporate espionage, however, is illegal. That's the line separating what you've listed from what 'some guy' did.

The law may be an ass, but it's the law. It's up to society to care enough about 'not nice' to force the laws to be changed.

(This doesn't relate to your sympathy, but it does relate to how a business acts to maximise it's own interests within the limitations provided by the state / federal laws).

I agree with you that there is a crime called "corporate espionage", but thus far the accused has not been criminally charged. And if he is, I dont see why he should face any worse penalty than when white-collar executives break the law and escape all serious consequences. The only difference is the accused didn't have a golden parachute to retire with.

The free pass that the upper levels get is an inescapable systemic flaw that causes me frustration and blood pressure problems. (cough Panama Papers cough)

Gives me the kind of angst that Vader experienced when informed of Padme's passing. But less comically lame and more existentially threatening.

> I agree with you that there is a crime called "corporate espionage", but thus far the accused has not been criminally charged. And if he is, I dont see why he should face any worse penalty than when white-collar executives break the law and escape all serious consequences.

I think the obvious solution, the one which would truly be just, is to impose the proper punishment on everyone equally. We should not give someone a pass just because someone else successfully worked the system. Improve the system so that the wealthy are held equally accountable and cannot escape justice.

I'm a lurker who never posts (until now), but the bullet on SpaceX triggered me.

I'm a software engineer at SpaceX, and the idea that the average engineer here works 7 days a week is patently false. The average engineer here works 50-55 hours a week -- which I would argue is no different than any other top startup.

We work hard because we are fervently passionate about our mission and wanting to make a positive impact on the world. SpaceX recruits top talent, and every engineer that I know could easily get another job if they had any desire. Me and almost every other engineer at SpaceX that I've spoken to love working for SpaceX and Elon, so please don't pity SpaceX engineers or use it as a talking point in your vendetta against him.

50-55 shouldn't be normal. That's either >6 standard working days or 5 (fairly) long days.

Who are you to judge my life decisions about what I spend my time on? It's my choice and my life. I do what I love and nothing more. Go search elsewhere for controversy -- there's none here.

> we are fervently passionate about our mission

obviously the hiring managers aren't passionate enough to hire enough smart minds to get the work done within reasonable working hours. I'm sure it's not rocket science to see that if you take a job that requires 15 engineers but only hire 10 and keep the same deadline, then some member of upper management gets a fraction of those unused 5 salaries as his quarterly bonus, while you get to feel like a corporate hero for sacrificing 30-50% of your family time.

FTR I love what SpaceX has done and a lot of what Mr Musk has accomplished. I'm just saying if we want to play the game of leveling moral judgments at each other, let the games begin.

And yet, plenty of people sign up for it. I do what I love and nothing more. If I didn't wake up excited every day or have intense fun, I wouldn't work here. I love my job and work 50 hours a week because I want to. Maybe it's difficult for you to comprehend that some people might actually ENJOY their jobs and CHOOSE to work longer hours.

It's my life and I don't see how there's a controversy that I choose to spend it doing what I love -- especially when I honestly believe that I'm contributing to something that's making the world a better place. I think if you spoke to most SpaceX engineers, they'd say the same thing; the ones that I know (and I probably know a lot more than you) feel the same.

Tax-shopping is done by everyone, and the states are fully aware that tax shopping is a thing. Claiming this as a moral failing of Elon’s is bending the truth beyond breaking point.

Do you have sources for your other claims?

> Tax-shopping is done by everyone

And that includes Elon, and he can be judged for it.

As for my other claims, I'm from Reno and I know what the labor situation is like up there and how Tesla lied to the city and county about their plans.

Did you look for a car or house that best suited your needs and budget?

I'm not convinced that if a thing is legal and done by everyone in power, it is therefore not a moral failing. (The obvious counterexample is slavery, but there are less Godwinesque cases too.)

The moral failing is picking this thing that is common in business and singling one person out for doing it.

But there is no case to suggest that tax shopping is a moral failing. It is just the same as a person looking for a house or a car: you find what is in your budget and make decisions based on comfort and other non-fiscal concerns.

For the tax cuts, that's on the local government. They set the rates to attract businesses and that's what they got. Residents should blame their representatives.

They should blame their Federal representatives. States are left in a position of having to give massive tax breaks in order to attract/maintain large businesses. If Nevada refuses to give tax breaks, everyone will simply build elsewhere. There are businesses that cross state lines and back every few years to regain tax breaks.

It's a massive prisoner's delema - first to offer enough tax cuts gets the jobs. The only way to truly win is for no one to cut taxes for business.

> I'm going to act like I don't know how anything in the real world works so I can go on a moral crusade against this guy I heard is bad.

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