We're pretty sure that no one is rushing to dethrone Elon Musk of his new title: Highest Tax Payer to the U.S. government of all time - $11 Billion USD. We're also quite confident that CEO of Tesla, SpaceX, The Boring company...etc, does not relish this accomplishment, as compared to being recently named Time’s Person of the Year (for 2021).

The pandemic has brought to light the grave issue of widening chasm between those who are struggling during the COVID-19 pandemic and those who have seen their net worth balloon during the past two years. According to inequality.org, as of Oct 18th 2021:

America’s billionaires have grown $2.1 trillion richer during the pandemic, their collective fortune skyrocketing by 70 percent — from just short of $3 trillion at the start of the COVID crisis on March 18, 2020, to over $5 trillion on October 15 of this year, according to Forbes data analyzed by Americans for Tax Fairness (ATF) and the Institute for Policy Studies Program on Inequality (IPS).

Forbes list of Real-Time Billionaires, at the time of this writing, shows Top 15 U.S Billionaires wealth growth percentage, and it's an eye opener to say the least. 

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NameNet Worth
Mar. 18, 2020
($ Millions)		Net Worth
Oct. 15, 2021
($ Millions)		19 Month Wealth Growth
($ Millions)		19 Month % Wealth Growth
Number of Billionaires614745
TOTAL$2,947,500$5,019,395$2,071,89570.3%
Elon Musk$24,600$209,357$184,757751.0%
Jeff Bezos$113,000$192,234$79,23470.1%
Bill Gates$98,000$132,415$34,41535.1%
Larry Ellison$59,000$124,533$65,533111.1%
Larry Page$50,900$120,718$69,818137.2%
Mark Zuckerberg$54,700$117,570$62,870114.9%
Sergey Brin$49,100$116,340$67,240136.9%
Warren Buffett$67,500$102,165$34,66551.4%
Steve Ballmer$52,700$96,912$44,21283.9%
Jim Walton$54,600$65,391$10,79119.8%
Alice Walton$54,400$64,473$10,07318.5%
Rob Walton$54,100$64,188$10,08818.6%
Michael Bloomberg$48,000$59,000$11,00022.9%
Phil Knight$29,500$57,949$28,44996.4%
MacKenzie Scott$36,000$55,488$19,48854.1%

Elon Musk sits at the top-of the list with a whopping 751% wealth growth. Top-3 are rounded off by Bezos and Gates. The next on the list are founders of Oracle, Google and Facebook (Meta).

Democrats, including senators Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren, have suggested that billionaires have enriched themselves on the backs of taxpayers, whilst refusing to pay their fair share of taxes. Warren even went so far as to brand Musk a “freeloader,” leading to a Twitter war between her and Musk, in which Musk called her “Senator Karen.”

The Tax Justice Network, a nongovernmental advocacy group, estimated that the world’s population could be fully vaccinated three times over with the $483 billion in taxes not paid by multinational corporations and wealthy individuals. The latter, they say, have evaded $171 billion in tax. In June ProPublica revealed the ultra-wealthy barely paid any taxes, referring to the likes of Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos, and Warren Buffett. 
“They have no interest in the truth,” Musk told Recode’s Kara Swisher. "My top marginal tax rate is 53%, so I don’t think that’s particularly low, and it’s going to go up next year.”. 
Musk has been shedding off Tesla stocks, leading many to speculate on the future of Tesla. To curb the speculation, Musk clarified that the “only way” for him to pay taxes is to sell stock. That's because he does not draw salary or bonus from any of his firms, and his fortune is tied solely to his equity holdings.


Whilst, it's quite interesting that Musk has become the poster child for tax evasions, even with his $11B USD tax bill, others on the list have yet to disclose how or if they would pay taxes.