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With Tesla Chief Elon Musk's latest comments on government workers getting weekends off reigniting the 90 hour work week debate, Kotak Mahindra AMC's Nilesh Shah questioned if the X (Twitter) owner will also get the brickbats and meme treatment as L&T Chairman SN Subramanyan or be praised “because he is Elon Musk?”
Shah also noted the widespread criticism towards Infosys co-founder Narayana Murthy's push for 70 hour work weeks. Writing on X ace investor Nilesh Shah asked, “It will be interesting to see how people react to this comment. Will he get memes like NRM and SNS or will he get appreciation because he is Elon Musk?” (sic)
Replying to a post on X about Elon Musk's US government department DOGE “speedrunning government reforms”, the tech billionaire said, “Very few in the bureaucracy actually work the weekend, so it’s like the opposing team just leaves the field for 2 days! Working the weekend is a superpower” (sic)
Musk's post itself has been viewed 15.8 million times on the platform, generating a host of responses.
Elon Musk is known for his quick banter online and for engaging with users on X, many who view him as a source of inspiration. Thus, Nilesh Shah's question gains significance.
On Musk's tweet, which he played off as light-hearted with a smiley emoji, the responses range from agreement, to disagreement and sarcasm. One user said, “It's hard to be a parent to kids and work on the weekends. At least for normal people without nannies and jets.” (sic)
Another jibed, “imagine not showing up on weekends. couldn’t be me” (sic), while one other responded seriously saying, “Can you imagine a society where everyone works the weekends, or 7 days a week? It is ok for some in society to choose that, but there is definitely more to life than work. You are free to choose to work 7 days a week, but you are not free to force others to do the same” (sic)
While Musk has not directly expressed any opinion on the 90-hour or 70-hour work week debates, a 2018 post by the world's richest man gained momentum in January at the height of furore against Subramanyan. Musk wrote on X in 2018: “Nobody ever changed the world with 40 hours a week.”
The post soliciting people to join his companies Tesla, SpaceX, Boring Company and Neuralink stated that there are way easier places to work, but nobody ever changed the world on 40 hours a week. “But if you love what you do, it (mostly) doesn’t feel like work,” said Musk.
Later in response to one user asking him what would be the “correct” hours to work to change the world, Musk responded: “Varies per person, but about 80 sustained, peaking above 100 at times.”
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