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Comment by marricks | Hacker News Reader

I'd really think a bit more about it. We have so many problems here and none are solved by leaving. Climate change, wealth inequality, hungry, poor. None of the billionaires (Musk/Bezos) building rockets treat their workers terribly well now, and their end game will just be exploiting workers around the solar system. Coming as a past fan of space exploration is was pretty devastating to realize...

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"terribly well"

What would be your standard in treating employees terribly well?

And it is strange to mention Musk and Bezos side by side. Their mode of employment is very different.

In Amazon, you are a preprogrammed cog in a spinning retail machine, micromanaged and followed everywhere by algorithms that seek to squeeze maximal output from you and punish you for slight deviations from the script (such as "not having your hand on a railing if you go upstairs"). They even encourage other workers to report you if you do something frowned upon. Human robots - which corresponds well to the nature of Bezos, who is often described as a way-too-rational, aloof man.

This is not what happens around Musk, who is a very different type of personality. In SpaceX, young engineers do overtime voluntarily because they are working on interesting unsolved problems, precisely the thing that you want to take part in at least once in your life. And it is understood that once they leave for a workplace with less driven culture, their stint at SpaceX will be considered very valuble.

Edit: If you are a youngish creative engineering type, you want to have a go at something that is both difficult and world changing. Most people will never have a chance to do so. So if you really become a part of a team that designs Starship etc., no wonder you will spend hours and hours there.

From my personal experience, chasing a difficult bug in my program means that the day flies by and suddenly, the streetlamps are lit. But the victorious feeling is worth it. And my software products are nothing like Starship.

I think with SpaceX there are people who leave and tell people they were expected to work long, hard hours, as though not having a 7.5 hour days is a crime against employment. There are jobs out there for folks who want 7.5 hour days, but these will not be jobs where you're putting feet on Mars.

There will be people who want to work long, hard hours on complex problems, and for them, somewhere like SpaceX will be perfect. Just because it doesn't fit the ideals of others doesn't mean that it's bad.

The key is choice. I doubt anyone is forced to work at SpaceX. I'm sure they could leave if they had enough, or not join if they didn't like the deal.

If anything, having it available for people who /do/ want to dedicate themselves to something is a good thing. I think some folks could do to remember that. There are enough easy jobs.

I think there is a certain discrepancy between how progressive Musk is in technological terms, and how he behaves like any other billionaire in social terms. Look for example how he pushed for the reopening of the Tesla factories despite covid lockdowns, potentially putting the workers lives at risk. Or how he recently tweeted against the US stimulus package while Tesla is receiving billions in corporate aid.

This discrepancy is preventing me from fully cheering for the man, and I guess it causes a certain cognitive dissonance and an irrational defense of everything the man does by his fans.

I recall hearing Musks engineers are also not paid very well, despite the expectation to work very hard.

Did you read about how the whole space race (and the first photo of earth) inspired people to start the environmental movement in the first place?

Also, btw, my gf is a full time climate change activist and watched sn8’s start witb as much excitement as myself.

Earth's problems are largely political, bureaucratic, and cultural. The people who love and are good at those areas have very little overlap with people who love and are good at tech, science, or space. The best we can do is provide something that magnifies our aspirations as a species, so that we and others will be inspired to improve our lot.

Perhaps Elon is not the best example for climate change due to his battery research, solar panels, electric cars, etc...

Eh, I’d say he’s a fine example. Musk may be trying to help the environment but he’s not going to save it, that’s for sure, and his future dream doesn’t involve treating his workers any better than he is now.

Is this about the environment or about labor rights?

And if Elon "solar panels, electric cars and in-house batteries" Musk doesn't contribute enough to save the environment, what exactly are you hoping for instead?

So because he can't fix the climate by himself, fuck him. And his workers are treated pretty well, his companies often rank on top of places people want to work.

His factory workers are? With all the workplace injuries? If you're just talking about his engineers then I think you have some serious issues.

His factory workers a payed like factory workers, better then most factory workers, less then some, he is not running a charity.

And the short-seller meme of Tesla factory being a death trap is just nonsense. In the first couple of years, Tesla as a company had somewhat more injuries then companies that have literally existed for 100 years but not really by much. How horrible, the company wasn't perfect from day 1.

Additionally Tesla is in the by far most regulated place in the US in terms health reporting and regulation. Why do you think every other car company has left California?

Maybe ask the workers in the city if the would rather the car plant be closed, like every other car plant or not.

You just hate him based on the political philosophy you have clearly adopted, so you need to find reasons to justify your hate to fit it in your framework. You have to re-frame the whole story into some sort of dystopian future space based slave society in order to justify shitting on the progress.

Irrational optimism is far more likely to lead to irrationally optimistic outcomes. Today is a good example. Space exploration gives people hope for what is possible. That is very, very important.

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