Anyone beginning to suspect that maybe Musk isn’t quite as bright as many people seem to think he is?
@PaulSchleifer I'd say it's a classic case of the Dunning-Kruger effect.
We can all overestimate our abilities in fields at the limits of, or outside, our expertise.
He's just doing it on a world stage, very publicly, with lots of money involved, and many people affected.
As an aside point, why is it that American companies seem not to give a flying **** about their employees?
I used to work for an American bank and one day everyone on the payroll received an e-mail saying that the value of the banks shares had nosedived and that in order to support the share price, as they put it, “on the street”, some number of hundreds of employees worldwide would be fired.
I live in Luxembourg and was a party to the shouted conversation between the executive who made that decision in the US and one of the board-level managers where I worked. The American executive seemed wholly unaware that in Europe we have employment laws and that you cannot just fire people from one day to the next because you feel like it. In Luxembourg, there are procedures to be followed to make someone redundant and a very substantial sum is usually required as a redundancy payment. In the case of our branch in Luxembourg they ended up only firing one person because it would have been too expensive to fire very many. The one guy they chose to fire had been with the company for 12 or 14 years and was therefore entitled to 6 months full salary with holidays as a redundancy payment.
@TimWardCam @pete @PaulSchleifer
I long ago reached the conclusion that US society has a massive streak of masochism running through it; that, along with a deep longing for bondage and restriction! Why else would a society so extremely rich, forego the right to a proper universal healthcare system. Why else would they impose silly character limits on Twatter?
@Paulos_the_fog @TimWardCam @PaulSchleifer
Much of UK employment law finds its roots in union initiatives.
The US and its worship of capitalism has long been suspicious of anything socialist (in the European sense of the word), and has caricatured it as communism.
I have US colleagues, grown adults, who can't believe that society can succeed if people have more than 10 days holiday a year. Or paternity leave of any kind. Or state provided medical care.
@Paulos_the_fog @TimWardCam @PaulSchleifer
Regarding masochism, Timothy Snyder talks about #sadopopulism:
@pete @TimWardCam @PaulSchleifer
Yes, I lived in Thailand for a while where, for the 1st time in my life, I met lots of Americans socially. I was truly staggered at their overwhelming ignorance of anything outside of the USA. They had no idea what life was like anywhere in Europe and were extremely resentful if I tried to explain that universal socialized healthcare universal in Europe. Suggesting that it should be implemented in the USA was tantamount to suggested we barbecue a human baby alive for dinner!
@Paulos_the_fog @pete @PaulSchleifer
We meet Americans socially in the UK. But ... these are Americans who prefer to live in the UK rather than the US, and there's no arguing with them about US culture, because they agree with us!
@pete @Paulos_the_fog @PaulSchleifer
It's taken to extremes - they still use things like pounds and inches, and their own special snowflake paper sizes, because international standards are European and therefore commie.
@pete @TimWardCam @PaulSchleifer
Poor sad bästards! Germany is No 2 after China in exporting manufactured goods having long since overtaken the USA in that regard. They have universal healthcare, sick pay, 20+ days paid holidays, paternal and maternal leave and a host of other benefits that would make the average American green with envy, but of course their state is a complete failure!
@Paulos_the_fog @pete @PaulSchleifer Americans must like it that way or, being a democracy, they'd change it.