New Delhi: Elon Musk, the CEO of Tesla, is debating whether he should sell 10% of his shares in the electric vehicle (EV) company on Twitter, despite calls in Washington to raise taxes on billionaires like him.
Some Democrats have proposed that billionaires pay taxes when the value of the stocks they own rises, even if they don't sell any. It's known as "unrealized gains," and Musk, who has a net worth of around $300 billion, has a lot of them.
“Much is made lately of unrealized gains being a means of tax avoidance, so I propose selling 10% of my Tesla stock,” he tweeted Saturday afternoon. “Do you support this?”
Out of a total of 876,189 votes, 54 percent responded yes by 5:40 p.m. Eastern time, a little more than two hours after Musk's initial tweet.
Musk's fortune is largely made up of Tesla stock, which does not pay him a salary in cash. “I only have stock, thus the only way for me to pay taxes personally is to sell stock,” he tweeted.
Musk, noted for his witty tweets, stated that he will "abide by the results of this vote."
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