Elon Musk does not understand the concept of a work week. After being criticized by many news outlets, including The Guardian and The Wall Street Journal, over the labour practices of his companies, Musk dismissed the claims with a series of Tweets, saying that "nobody ever changed the world on 40 hours a week." As The Guardian put it, "while the billionaire’s loose tongue and overly optimistic pronouncements may still excite his legions of fans and customers, many factory workers feel that they have become collateral damage."
The criticisms faced by Tesla include a lack of accountability to injured workers and an environment which uses the excitement surrounding Tesla and SpaceX's ambitions to gloss over the day-to-day experience of employees. Working more than forty hours as the CEO who's getting the big paycheque and the recognition for "changing the world" is not the same as being forced to work 12 hours a day, six days a week as an employee who isn't allowed to unionize: “Anyone can do anything for an hour,” a Tesla employee said. “You have to do it like we do it, 12 hours a day, six days a week … Live the life we live. That’s where the wear and tear comes from.”
Here are Musk's tweets:
Uh-huh.
