What are Elon Musk’s charitable donations and are they a tax write-off?

Elon Musk and Donald Trump seem to be in competition for the title of most hate-able billionaire on the planet, and it’s hard to say who’s winning.

On one hand you have Trump, the incoming president of the United States with mind-bogglingly selfish motivations to create a plutocracy. On the other you have egomaniac Musk, an online troll who somehow crawled his way off 4chan long enough to worm his way into Trump’s administration. Both men are set to be granted nearly unchecked power on Jan. 20, 2025, after which they’ll have four years to reshape this country into a soul-crushing Capitalist nightmare that benefits only the richest of the rich.

Trump has far more power than Musk, but Musk is much smarter than Trump. That’s not to say he’s overly smart — he’s good at buying up businesses, but X is clear evidence of his aptitude at running them — but he does understand how to play the game. Unlike Trump, he’s not mired in constant legal battles (yet), and a big part of that is how he handles all that money. Years of wealth haven’t taught Trump much about how to game the system, but there’s a reason Elon Musk is the wealthiest man on the planet, even after he makes donations to charity.

Elon Musk’s charitable donations

Elon Musk is by no means a charitable man, but he has put at least a small amount of his eye-popping bank account toward other people. Just ahead of the New Year, Musk donated 268,000 Tesla shares — equal to around $108.2 million — to unnamed charities that have “no current intention to sell” the stocks. This follows similar charitable donations in 2021 and 2022, in which he donated Tesla stocks worth around $5.74 billion and $1.95 billion respectively.

Musk’s largest donation in recent years — the $5.74 billion in 2021 — was given to the Musk Foundation, the billionaire’s own non-profit organization. It offers grants for various causes, including the furtherment of artificial intelligence research, something close to Musk’s heart.

The numbers are by no means small, but when compared to Musk’s overwhelming net worth, they barely scratch the surface. Musk is worth an eye-watering $415.8 billion, and this year’s donation — the $108.2 million worth of shares — equates to less than half of a single percent of Musk’s wealth. Around 0.026%, to be precise.

Are Elon Musk’s charitable donations tax deductible?

Even though they’re a small percentage of his overall wealth, Musk is still making donations to charity. Most people see that as inherently charitable, despite the fact that he often donates to his own non-profit, but it’s likely that Musk is actually making money off of his so-called charity.

Musk’s non-profit has never hired a paid employee, which really takes those overhead costs down, and if Musk is claiming those donations on his personal taxes — a very likely possibility — they’re actually quite beneficial, according to the New York Times. Tax deductions in the United States make plenty of space for charitable gifts, and in Musk’s case, they likely saved him up to $2 billion on his own tax bills.