Published: 08/01/2023

Category: On The Job

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Summer Series – Elon Musk, Twitter, and why billionaires are a really bad idea

In the latest episode of our summer series, we head back to June 2022.

At the time, Tesla billionaire Elon Musk was launching a hostile takeover bid for one of the world’s biggest and most influential social media platforms, Twitter.

At the same time, the Tesla founder has been playing footsy with the libertarian/alt-right, blabbing on about freedom of speech, and promising to unleash the dogs of hate speech and misinformation back onto the platform.

Now had did that all turn out for the man who was then, the world’s richest man?

Is it healthy that one individual can amass such outsized wealth and influence whilst tens of millions of people struggle to make a living?

What is the danger that the billionaire class poses to the health of our society?

John L. Campbell is a sociologist and economist at Dartmouth University in New Hampshire in the United States.

He’s been writing about these very issues. 

John joined me on the pod to discuss.

 

 

You can now email us with your comments, story ideas, tip-offs, flip offs, and questions – otjpodcast@protonmail.com

On the Job is made by Australian Unions.

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About the host

Francis Leach is Editor at Large for the Australian Council of Trade Unions

Twitter – @SaintFrankly

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