On the issue of whether Musk is allowed to review functions that he has a conflict with, he has only stated that Musk is not allowed to do so.
This is a man who sharpies extra lines onto weather maps so he doesn't have to say "whoops, made a mistake in my tweet". https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hurricane_Dorian%E2%80%93Alaba...
If we're honest this is all just unfounded speculation.
Financially, he's likely going to benefit from a deregulatory agenda, but is it enough to offset his investments to get Trump elected (buying Twitter, America PAC)? Who knows
Is his work at USAID in any way related to his financial outcomes? Who knows
Would he make just as much sitting on the couch while the republicans do their thing? Probably
Does he even care about making more money, given he's got more than he can possibly spend already? Who knows.
If I were to guess, he's at a point in his life where money isn't his main motivator, and instead he's seeking to make an impact.
It seems pretty clear by now that this never happens with billionaires.
Bill Gates is giving his money away to charity as quickly as he can do while maintaining effectiveness.
Sergey Brin is goofing around with airships.
Plenty of examples of billionaries living life rather than focusing on making more money.
With the goal of making money.
> Bill Gates is giving his money away to charity as quickly as he can do while maintaining effectiveness.
Perhaps the best example here, but he's still working quite a bit to make money. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BENlabs https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TerraPower https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cascade_Investment https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gates_Ventures https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Breakthrough_Energy
> Sergey Brin is goofing around with airships.
With the goal of making money.
Secondly, I don't believe Musk has any direct authority to make any changes within these agencies whatsoever. DOGE is only permitted to review agency operations and make recommendations, not to execute them.
The changes that are being attributed to Musk, are perhaps being done at his recommendation, but there is an agency director signing off on all of this.
We also know that he has no moral compass and no qualm whatsoever using any lever he can to make money. The moment to worry about this is before he leaves with the till. Because everyone knows he will, and by then it will be too late.
We don't know that.
Musk has several times lobbied against EV subsidies which would directly benefit Tesla, because he viewed the subsidies as excessive.
Of course he wants to kneecap his emerging competitors in the space.
Same technique OpenAI is using with advocating for AI regulation.
You can find the executive order on the whitehouse website.
Technically it's a renaming of the USDS
Bad news: this limitation will be enforced by… Musk himself.
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2025-02-05/white-hou...
> The White House said Elon Musk, the billionaire leading President Donald Trump’s government cost-cutting efforts, will determine if there are conflicts of interest between his work reviewing federal spending and his overlapping empire of six companies.