Elon Musk Says People Get 'Confused' Thinking An Economy Is Money — If You're Shipwrecked With $1 Trillion In Swiss Bank, Better To ‘Have A Can Of Soup' - United States News Beep

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A trillion dollars sounds pretty useful — until the shipwreck hits. Then suddenly, the bank balance isn’t looking nearly as appetizing as a can of soup.

Tesla and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk made the point in an interview for the WELT Documentary channel in 2022.

“People get confused sometimes,” Musk told Axel Springer CEO Mathias Döpfner. “They think an economy is money, but money is a database for the exchange of goods and services and for time-shifting the exchange of goods and services,” he continued. “Money is a database. Money does not have power in and of itself.”

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Then came the thought experiment that turned a fairly dry discussion about economics into a memorable one.

“You can run the thought experiment: if you are shipwrecked on a remote island and you have a trillion dollars in a Swiss bank account, it’s worthless,” Musk said. “You would rather have a can of soup. You can have all the Bitcoin in the world and you’re still going to starve. The actual economy is goods and services.”

Musk’s point was that money only works because it represents access to things people actually produce and provide. A bank account can show a giant number, but it can’t manufacture food, build shelter or provide medical care when there is nobody around to supply those things.

Musk Sees AI Changing What Money Means

That idea has taken on a different meaning as Musk has increasingly focused on artificial intelligence and robotics.

He has said that AI and robots could eventually produce so many goods and services that traditional ideas about money and work could become less important. Musk has also recently suggested that saving for retirement could eventually become irrelevant if technology creates an era of extreme abundance.

That future remains a prediction, not today’s economic reality. For now, people still need money to pay for housing, food, healthcare and retirement.

But investors betting on AI don’t necessarily have to pick the company that builds the next blockbuster chatbot. The infrastructure behind AI could offer another way to gain exposure.

See Also: AI Is Writing More Code Than Ever. Now The Industry Is Running Into A New Problem.

Different Pieces Of The Boom

Bito is building software designed to help AI coding agents understand large, complicated codebases. Its AI Architect maps a company’s software system so coding agents have more context, while its Governor product is designed to route coding tasks to AI models based on the job and cost. The company is currently raising money through Wefunder, with a minimum investment of $1,000.

American PowerGen is taking a different route. The company is developing power projects in Texas aimed at meeting the growing electricity needs of data centers and other large users. Its model focuses on securing sites, power connections and natural gas supplies before developing projects that could ultimately be sold or operated. The company is raising capital through Regulation Crowdfunding, with shares available to investors 18 and older.

For investors who believe AI will reshape the economy, those businesses offer a look at two less obvious pieces of the story — the software helping AI work and the electricity needed to keep it running.

Musk’s soup analogy gets at the same basic idea. The value isn’t really in the number sitting in an account. It’s in what that number can ultimately buy, build or make possible.

Read Next: America Has A Housing Problem. It’s Not Just About Low-Income Housing. A Growing Shortage Is Hitting The Workers Who Keep Communities Running.

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American PowerGen

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Bito

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DLP Capital

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This article Elon Musk Says People Get ‘Confused’ Thinking An Economy Is Money — If You’re Shipwrecked With $1 Trillion In Swiss Bank, Better To ‘Have A Can Of Soup’ originally appeared on Benzinga.com

Elon Musk Says People Get ‘Confused’ Thinking An Economy Is Money — If You’re Shipwrecked With $1 Trillion In Swiss Bank, Better To ‘Have A Can Of Soup’

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