Elon Musk is taking a stand in favor of making child care more accessible. Earlier today he tweeted that he’s planning to increase childcare benefits in his companies. He also said that the Musk Foundation will help families directly. In another tweet, he replied to Sara Mauskopf, the CEO and co-founder of Winnie.
Winnie focuses on helping parents to find local daycares and preschools while also providing details on these schools such as photos, detailed descriptions of the programs, and tuition information.
Agreed, this needs to be addressed
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) July 8, 2022
Sara Mauskopf’s thread started with an article by CNN that covered the surging child care costs that are forcing providers to raise their prices. As she continued her thread, Sara Mauskopf pointed out that there is record low labor force participation among women with young children who don’t have a college degree. She continued.
“So this is further exacerbating the problem because many of these women who would be taking jobs in the care economy are not participating in the labor market – hence why hiring is such a challenge right now for child care providers.”
She added a quote from a New York Times article, that highlighted the issue of a shortage of childcare and elder services that are preventing workers, especially women, from being able to work.
“For women, that’s the double whammy — most of those workers are women, and most of the people who need those supports to enter the workforce themselves are women.”
4/ And in 10 months we’re going to start seeing the impact of abortion bans on our strained child care system. Remember that we have no federal paid leave so as soon as these babies are born, we’ll have 📈 parents who need child care they can’t afford https://t.co/xSiQmUAhge
— Sara Mauskopf (@sm) July 8, 2022
She added that within the next ten months, we will start seeing the impact of abortion bans on the strained child care system.
“Remember that we have no federal paid leave so as soon as these babies are born, we’ll have 
parents who need child care they can’t afford.”
She then added that Elon Musk spoke about population collapse.
“I believe that if we want to encourage big families, we have to make child care more accessible. Elon, I’d love to talk more about how we make this a reality.”
To this, Elon Musk replied, “Agreed, this needs to be addressed.”
Addressing The Elephant Head On
This is what I've been saying for a while now: raising children for average people is very expensive. Our youngest (child #4 btw) is entering High School now. From oldest to youngest we've been paying for raising them from 1994 to at least 2026. 3+ decades is a lot of expenses
— DrKnowItAll (@DrKnowItAll16) July 8, 2022
One common criticism of Elon Musk’s stance on population is that people can’t afford to have kids. I’ve seen it, heard it, and I also agree with that–somewhat. I have spoken about my own thoughts and experience on this matter already. Several of my friends who do have children have highlighted this problem. Single parents have it more intensely than those who have a partner. This is why childcare services are so important.
Vox shared an interesting article as to why many in America don’t want to have kids in 2022. The infant formula shortage, the high cost of providing nutritious food, and taking care of the child are challenging problems. Especially for single parents with little or no support system. The US doesn’t have paid parental leave and the article noted that child care costs more than college in many states–if the parent can find a provider.
If we want women to work, we have to have a support system in place for their children. The article listed other problems such as school shootings, and the U.S. being ranked worst for maternal mortality in a group of 10 similarly wealthy countries. You can read the full article in Vox here.
Elon Musk Using His Influence To Address Some Of These Problems
Seeing Elon Musk use his influence on Twitter to address some of these problems today was refreshing. He is definitely worried about the population decline. And he advocates for having more children. It’s good to see him want to take on the problems that many Americans, especially single parents, have.
This is important and I think some good will come from this.
News
Tesla adds new feature that will be great for crowded parking situations
This is the most recent iteration of the app and was priming owners for the slowly-released Holiday Update.
Tesla has added a new feature that will be great for crowded parking lots, congested parking garages, or other confusing times when you cannot seem to pinpoint where your car went.
Tesla has added a new Vehicle Locator feature to the Tesla App with App Update v4.51.5.
This is the most recent iteration of the app and was priming owners for the slowly-released Holiday Update.
While there are several new features, which we will reveal later in this article, perhaps one of the coolest is that of the Vehicle Locator, which will now point you in the direction of your car using a directional arrow on the home screen. This is similar to what Apple uses to find devices:
Interesting. The location arrow in the Tesla app now points to your car when you’re nearby. pic.twitter.com/b0yjmwwzxN
— Whole Mars Catalog (@wholemars) December 7, 2025
In real time, the arrow gives an accurate depiction of which direction you should walk in to find your car. This seems extremely helpful in large parking lots or unfamiliar shopping centers.
Getting to your car after a sporting event is an event all in itself; this feature will undoubtedly help with it:
The nice little touch that Tesla have put in the app – continuous tracking of your vehicle location relative to you.
There’s people reporting dizziness testing this.
To those I say… try spinning your phone instead. 😉 pic.twitter.com/BAYmJ3mzzD
— Some UK Tesla Guy (UnSupervised…) (@SomeUKTeslaGuy) December 8, 2025
Tesla’s previous app versions revealed the address at which you could locate your car, which was great if you parked on the street in a city setting. It was also possible to use the map within the app to locate your car.
However, this new feature gives a more definitive location for your car and helps with the navigation to it, instead of potentially walking randomly.
It also reveals the distance you are from your car, which is a big plus.
Along with this new addition, Tesla added Photobooth features, Dog Mode Live Activity, Custom Wraps and Tints for Colorizer, and Dashcam Clip details.
🚨 Tesla App v4.51.5 looks to be preparing for the Holiday Update pic.twitter.com/ztts8poV82
— TESLARATI (@Teslarati) December 8, 2025
All in all, this App update was pretty robust.
Tesla CEO Elon Musk shaded Waymo in a post on X on Wednesday, stating the company “never really had a chance” and that it “will be obvious in hindsight.”
Tesla and Waymo are the two primary contributors to the self-driving efforts in the United States, with both operating driverless ride-hailing services in the country. Tesla does have a Safety Monitor present in its vehicles in Austin, Texas, and someone in the driver’s seat in its Bay Area operation.
Musk says the Austin operation will be completely void of any Safety Monitors by the end of the year.
🚨 Tesla vs. Waymo Geofence in Austin https://t.co/A6ffPtp5xv pic.twitter.com/mrnL0YNSn4
— TESLARATI (@Teslarati) December 10, 2025
With the two companies being the main members of the driverless movement in the U.S., there is certainly a rivalry. The two have sparred back and forth with their geofences, or service areas, in both Austin and the Bay Area.
While that is a metric for comparison now, ultimately, it will not matter in the coming years, as the two companies will likely operate in a similar fashion.
Waymo has geared its business toward larger cities, and Tesla has said that its self-driving efforts will expand to every single one of its vehicles in any location globally. This is where the true difference between the two lies, along with the fact that Tesla uses its own vehicles, while Waymo has several models in its lineup from different manufacturers.
The two also have different ideas on how to solve self-driving, as Tesla uses a vision-only approach. Waymo relies on several things, including LiDAR, which Musk once called “a fool’s errand.”
This is where Tesla sets itself apart from the competition, and Musk highlighted the company’s position against Waymo.
Jeff Dean, the Chief Scientist for Google DeepMind, said on X:
“I don’t think Tesla has anywhere near the volume of rider-only autonomous miles that Waymo has (96M for Waymo, as of today). The safety data is quite compelling for Waymo, as well.”
Musk replied:
“Waymo never really had a chance against Tesla. This will be obvious in hindsight.”
Waymo never really had a chance against Tesla. This will be obvious in hindsight.
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) December 10, 2025
Tesla stands to have a much larger fleet of vehicles in the coming years if it chooses to activate Robotaxi services with all passenger vehicles. A simple Over-the-Air update will activate this capability, while Waymo would likely be confined to the vehicles it commissions as Robotaxis.
News
Tesla supplier Samsung preps for AI5 production with latest move
According to a new report from Sedaily, Samsung is accelerating its preparation for U.S. production of the AI5 chips by hiring veteran engineers for its Customer Engineering team.
Tesla supplier Samsung is preparing to manufacture the AI5 chip, which will launch the company’s self-driving efforts even further, with its latest move.
According to a new report from Sedaily, Samsung is accelerating its preparation for U.S. production of the AI5 chips by hiring veteran engineers for its Customer Engineering team, which will help resolve complex foundry challenges, stabilize production and yields, and ensure manufacturing goes smoothly for the new project.
The hiring push signals that Tesla’s AI5 project is moving forward quickly at Samsung, which was one of two suppliers to win a contract order from the world’s leading EV maker.
🚨🚨 FIRST LOOK at Tesla’s AI5 chip, which will be available in late 2026 or early 2027 pic.twitter.com/aLomUuifhT
— TESLARATI (@Teslarati) November 6, 2025
TSMC is the other. TSMC is using its 3nm process, reportedly, while Samsung will do a 2nm as a litmus test for the process.
The different versions are due to the fact that “they translate designs to physical form differently,” CEO Elon Musk said recently. The goal is for the two to operate identically, obviously, which is a challenge.
Some might remember Apple’s A9 “Chipgate” saga, which found that the chips differed in performance because of different manufacturers.
The AI5 chip is Tesla’s next-generation hardware chip for its self-driving program, but it will also contribute to the Optimus program and other AI-driven features in both vehicles and other projects. Currently, Tesla utilizes AI4, formerly known as HW4 or Hardware 4, in its vehicles.
Tesla teases new AI5 chip that will revolutionize self-driving
AI5 is specialized for use by Tesla as it will work in conjunction with the company’s Neural Networks, focusing on real-time inference to make safe and logical decisions during operation.
Musk said it was an “amazing design” and an “immense jump” from Tesla’s current AI4 chip. It will be roughly 40 times faster, and have 8 times the raw compute, with 9 times the memory capacity. It is also expected to be three times as efficient per watt as AI4.
“We’re going to focus TSMC and Samsung, initially, on AI5. The AI5 chip, design by Tesla, it’s an amazing design. I’ve spent almost every weekend for the last few months with the chip team working on AI5.”
It will be 40x better than the AI4 chip, Musk says.
— TESLARATI (@Teslarati) October 22, 2025
AI5 will make its way into “maybe a small number of units” next year, Musk confirmed. However, it will not make its way to high-volume production until 2027. AI5 is not the last step, either, as Musk has already confirmed AI6 would likely enter production in mid-2028.
Tesla adds new feature that will be great for crowded parking situations
Tesla CEO Elon Musk shades Waymo: ‘Never really had a chance’
