VATICAN CITY — Pope Leo XIV has raised concerns about Tesla’s proposed $1 trillion compensation package for its chief executive, Elon Musk, describing it as a stark example of global wealth inequality.
In his first media interview since becoming pope, published on Sunday, September 14, 2025, by Crux, the pontiff questioned the morality of massive corporate payouts at a time when economic disparities are widening worldwide.
“Yesterday, the news broke that Elon Musk is going to be the first trillionaire in the world. What does that mean, and what’s that about? If that is the only thing that has value anymore, then we’re in big trouble,” Pope Leo said.
Tesla’s board unveiled the plan earlier this month, linking Musk’s potential payday to ambitious operational milestones.
These include raising Tesla’s valuation to $8.5 trillion, selling 12 million vehicles over the next decade, and deploying one million robotaxis.
The package will be subject to a shareholder vote at the company’s annual meeting in November.
Robyn Denholm, Tesla’s chair, has defended the proposal as necessary to secure Musk’s focus despite his leadership of other ventures, including SpaceX, Neuralink, and xAI.
“To me, the plan is super ambitious, and that is what motivates Elon,” she told CNBC.
Speaking to Bloomberg, she emphasised that Musk “gets nothing if he doesn’t achieve the goals.”
The pope, however, said such figures highlight a moral crisis. Comparing today’s CEO pay to earlier decades, he noted: “Sixty years ago, CEOs made maybe four to six times more than their workers, but now, according to the last figures I saw, it is 600 times more.”
He linked the widening pay gap to political and social divisions within and beyond the Catholic Church.
“Add on top of that a couple of other factors, one which I think is very significant, is the continuously wider gap between the income levels of the working class and the money that the wealthiest receive,” Pope Leo said.
The pontiff, born Cardinal Robert Prevost in Chicago and elected in May as the first U.S.-born pope, has made economic justice a recurring theme.
At a Vatican summit in June, he urged leaders to reduce “the unacceptable disproportion between the immense wealth concentrated in the hands of a few and the world’s poor,” warning that such inequality breeds “persistent injustice, violence, and, sooner or later, the tragedy of war.”
