Did Elon Musk say: “Marx was a capitalist. He even wrote a book about it”?

In March 2025, a screenshot of a tweet from the richest man on the planet and sarcastic comments about his ignorance went viral on the Internet. We checked whether Musk really wrote this.

March 22 supposed quote from billionaire shared on the social network X Russian music critic Artemy Troitsky. His tweet with the ironic comment “Smart, educated person” has received almost 300,000 views at the time of writing this analysis, causing heated discussions among other users. Many, like Trinity himself, decidedthat a close adviser to the US President seriously called Marx a capitalist, since he wrote a book about it, and joked, that according to this logic, “Dostoevsky was an idiot,” and “Arkady and Boris Strugatsky were snails and lived on a slope.” A screenshot of Musk's alleged tweet was also widely circulated on Facebook, Telegram, LiveJournal and other social networks.

The screenshot posted by Troitsky shows that the tweet about Marx was a response to previous posts by Musk and a user with the username @AntVenom. "Verified" found complete correspondence, which took place on June 16, 2018.

It started with tweet Mask: “Those who call themselves socialists are usually sad, humorless, and went to expensive colleges.” When @AntVenom asked who the billionaire considers himself to be, he replied: “A socialist.” Then he added: “Marx was a capitalist. He even wrote a book about it.” The American businessman obviously meant "Capital" is the main work of the German philosopher and economist, in which he places capitalist processes in historical context, and also criticizes both capitalism itself and the political systems under which it flourishes.

Half an hour later Musk published new comments to the original post: ““No sense of humor” actually turned out to be true. My God! How many socialists does it take to change a light bulb? Answer: “This is not funny!” After this, the owner of the social network X was subjected to even more criticism from users: “I think it would be damn funny to impose a 90% tax on your accumulated wealth, you parasite,” wrote user @nberlat. And @feraljokes added: “You have the sense of humor of a 13-year-old girl.” As a result, two hours after publishing a post about sad socialists, Musk finished conversation with the phrase: “I’m going back to the factory, that’s enough for today. Don't take my tweet too seriously."

That is, in the context of the correspondence, it is clear that Musk’s tweet about Marx is deliberate trolling. Also, later that day, the billionaire stated, that he read “Capital” at the age of 14, in some places checked the English translation with the German original and that, of course, Adam Smith, the founder of the idea of ​​​​the free market, “wins.” So, most likely, the entrepreneur is familiar with the contents of the book and is unlikely to have made such a mistake when speaking about Marx’s philosophical views.

In November 2024, X introduced the “Explain this post» based on the built-in chat bot Grok. "Verified" asked him to analyze Musk's post about Marx to see if the AI, unlike many users, could detect sarcasm in a single tweet from owner X. 

Grok responded that the "Marx was a capitalist" tweet was part of an exchange in which Musk poked fun at socialists and then jokingly referred to himself as one, illustrating his penchant for making ironic and provocative statements about political ideologies.

So Musk did write that Marx was a capitalist, but he did it in a sarcastic tone. Nevertheless, the joke, taken out of context, is circulating on social networks and causing outrage among users who are surprised at the billionaire’s ignorance.

Cover photo: social networks

Taken out of context

What do our verdicts mean?

Read on topic:

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2. Arzamas. What is written in Marx's main book, Capital?
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5. Is it true that Elon Musk was included in the “Peacemaker” database after his tweet about Zelensky?