Elon Musk poised to make history as world’s first trillionaire

Elon Musk attends proceedings in his lawsuit against OpenAI in Oakland, California, the US, on April 29, 2026 [File:Manuel Orbegozo/Reuters]

Guido Alfani, a professor of economic history at Bocconi University in Milan, Italy, said another way to compare the wealth of Musk and his predecessors is to consider the amount of human labour that could be purchased with their respective fortunes.

“If we do this, we can surely conclude that Elon Musk might be the wealthiest person who has ever lived – excluding emperors or other rulers whose wealth is not easily distinguishable from that of the state,” Alfani told Al Jazeera.

Alfani estimated that Musk could have commanded the work of 557,800 people in 2025, versus 116,000 by Rockefeller in 1937 or 48,000 by Carnegie in 1901.

Much as Musk is a polarising figure today, the tycoons that accumulated vast fortunes during the mid-to-late 1800s were controversial figures in their day.

‘Rich beyond anything seen before’

Astor was known as one of New York City’s largest and most unscrupulous landlords.

Carnegie, Rockefeller and their contemporaries during what became known as the Gilded Age were dubbed “Robber Barons” for their ruthless and anti-competitive business practices.

Much like Musk, the industrialists of the Gilded Age were rich beyond anything Americans had seen before, said Richard Wright, professor of history emeritus at Stanford University.

“What made them famous was that they were very good at making and keeping money. There is little sign they accomplished much else,” White told Al Jazeera.

“Some admired them for their wealth. Most of their contemporaries despised them.”

White said that magnates such as Rockefeller shared a common understanding that their wealth depended on being able to shape government policy.

“All intervened in politics,” White said.

“All this involved a degree, in the Gilded Age, a very high degree, of corruption.”

Larry Page speaks at the Fortune Global Forum in San Francisco, the US, on November 2, 2015 [File: Jeff Chiu/AP]

Musk, too, has deeply involved himself in politics, aligning himself with Donald Trump’s 2024 presidential campaign before going on to lead the Trump administration’s controversial campaign to cut waste and fraud in the federal government.

Since staging a $40bn hostile takeover of Twitter in 2022, Musk has used the social media platform, since renamed X, as a personal megaphone, promoting right-wing views on hot-button culture-war issues such as immigration and transgender rights.

Despite sharing an affinity for politics, Musk diverges from his ultra-rich predecessors in other ways.

For all their vast wealth, the magnates of the Gilded Age were prolific philanthropists, building hospitals, libraries, universities and museums and donating large sums to support efforts to eradicate illnesses such as hookworm and yellow fever.

Public good

“When examining the Robber Barons of the Gilded Age and Progressive Era, despite their many failings, one must note that they were also the pioneers of modern large-scale philanthropy,” Christopher Nichols, a professor of history at Ohio State University, told Al Jazeera.

Carnegie famously donated 90 percent of his wealth during the last two decades of his life, a sum that would have been worth at least $42bn in today’s money, according to the MeasuringWorth Foundation.

“Andrew Carnegie’s ‘Gospel of Wealth’ argued for the full-use of fortunes for the public good during their lifetimes, rather than leaving it to heirs,” Nichols said, referring to the tycoon’s 1889 essay arguing that the rich had a responsibility to help the less fortunate.

The SpaceX logo is seen on Space Exploration Technologies Corp. facility in Hawthorne, California, the US on June 9, 2026 [File: Patrick T. Fallon/AFP]

In 2010, Microsoft founder Bill Gates and legendary investor Warren Buffett launched the Giving Pledge, a philanthropic project aimed at encouraging the world’s wealthiest people to donate the majority of their wealth to charitable causes during their lifetimes or in their wills.

Musk joined the pledge in 2012, but the bulk of his philanthropic efforts have been directed through the Musk Foundation toward causes that intersect with his business ventures, according to the Capital Research Centre, a US-based think tank that monitors how non-profits spend their money.

In a closed-door lecture last year, billionaire investor Peter Thiel, who co-founded Paypal with Musk, said that he had urged his former colleague to renege on his promise because the funds would go to “left-wing nonprofits.”

While Musk has not publicly withdrawn from the pledge, he took Thiel’s advice seriously, according to the Thiel’s account of their discussions.

Political and social change

Musk has also shown a preference for donating through intermediaries such as Vanguard Charitable and Fidelity Charitable, which specialise in donor-advised funds.

Musk donated $37m to Vanguard Charitable in 2017, and $39m to Fidelity Charitable between 2018 and 2020, according to Capital Research Centre.

Perhaps the greatest difference between Musk and his predecessors is that – at least so far – his vast wealth has done little to spur sweeping political or societal change.

The Gilded Age was marked by widespread labour unrest and social activism that ultimately culminated in the passage of landmark anti-trust regulation, the establishment of the Federal Trade Commission and the institution of a federal income tax.

A US flag flutters at the Federal Trade Commission headquarters in Washington, DC, the US, on November 24, 2024 [File: Benoit Tessie/Reuters]

Joshua Rosenbloom, a professor of economics at Iowa State University, said the current political and economic system is structured in a way that is more resistant to change than the “far more fluid” order that prevailed from the 1870s to the late 1920s.

“Rockefeller and Carnegie exercised considerable power in their time, and Musk’s influence is not wildly different from theirs,” Rosenbloom told Al Jazeera.

“My sense is that at the turn of the 20th century, the rise of large concentrations of wealth was politically controversial, and perhaps more so than is true today,” he said.

“The 1890s and early twentieth century were characterised by relatively prominent labor protest and political violence, which we have not seen very much of in the present.”

Daniel Waldenström, a professor of economics at the Research Institute of Industrial Economics in Stockholm, Sweden, said that while Musk is likely the richest person who has ever lived, his wealth is not carved in stone.

“He faces competition and the market valuation of his corporations can change,” Waldenström told Al Jazeera.

“It may well be that some of Musk’s assets will lose value if reality changes,” Waldenström said.

“And this has also happened; only in 2022, the inflation boom made Tesla lose more than 60 percent of its market value.”