Can we debunk this nonsense?
Elon Musk was awarded (note: not given) cost-per-result contracts to perform a service for the US government. The total of those for SpaceX specifically is ~$22B, which includes repaid loans, state tax incentives, etc.
The deal was simple: put stuff into LEO at or below a set cost. If SpaceX does it below the set cost, SpaceX keeps the difference. If it doesn’t, the company is responsible for the overrun.
End result? SpaceX & Elon lowered the cost of getting 1 kg into LEO by 95-97% vs what NASA was paying previously.
And for the record, every other company around at the time was offered the same opportunity to bid on the contract - Musk/SpaceX just took it.
The handout narrative implies the taxpayer is the patron and SpaceX the dependent. The cost data shows the opposite: before SpaceX, NASA paid Russia’s Soyuz $80-86M per seat; SpaceX delivered at ~$55 million. SpaceX saved the US taxpayer $300M-$465M each year on that alone (the US sends 12-15 astronauts to space each year)
On the lunar lander, NASA estimated SpaceX’s fixed-price bid saved $20B-$30B vs the Boeing-preferred cost-plus approach.
So: SpaceX saved the US taxpayer more than the total value of contracts it earned on a single project, PLUS provided the US government with the requested services (put stuff in LEO) at the best possible price.
Elon Musk was given tens of billions in government contracts and tax breaks and was able to take a company that’s lost $41 billion and somehow become a “trillionaire.”
You will pay social security your whole life and they’ll tell you it’s an “entitlement” when you try to collect