Elon Musk to Cut 10% of Tesla Workforce over ‘Super Bad Feeling’ About Economy

Tesla CEO Elon Musk plans to cut ten percent of the jobs at his electric carmaker because he has a “super bad feeling” about the economy. The Company will also institute a hiring freeze, which has caused an 8% plunge in its stock price in intraday trading.

Elon Musk sent an email to Tesla executives on Thursday with the subject line, “pause all hiring worldwide,” according to the email seen by Reuters. Tesla currently employs 110,000 people, according to Electrek. Beyond a hiring freeze, Musk’s email indicates the company will cut around ten percent of its workforce.

While Musk did not elaborate in the email about why he has a “super bad feeling” about the economy, the billionaire has repeatedly been warning about the risk of recession in recent months.

“I think we are probably in a recession and that recession will get worse,” Musk said in May at a conference in Miami Beach. “It’ll probably be some tough going for, I don’t know, a year, maybe 12 to 18 months, is usually the amount of time that it takes for a correction to happen.”

In late May, after being asked by a Twitter user if the economy was approaching a recession, Musk replied: “Yes, but this is actually a good thing. It has been raining money on fools for too long. Some bankruptcies need to happen.”

“Also, all the Covid stay-at-home stuff has tricked people into thinking that you don’t actually need to work hard. Rude awakening inbound!” Musk added in his tweet.

The email telling Tesla executives to pause all hiring came just days after Musk told staff to return to the workplace or leave the company.

“Anyone who wishes to do remote work must be in the office for a minimum (and I mean *minimum*) of 40 hours per week or depart Tesla. This is less than we ask of factory workers,” Musk wrote in a Tuesday email.

“Everyone at Tesla is required to spend a minimum of 40 hours in the office per week,” Musk added in a follow-up email. “If you don’t show up, we will assume you have resigned.”

As of Friday morning, Tesla shares are down eight percent in intraday trading.

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