Tesla CEO Elon Musk announced that his private foundation, The Musk Foundation, plans to donate directly to families. He also tweeted that he is increasing childcare benefits at his companies and hopes that other companies follow suit.
You can read more about that in Simon’s article here. I’m going to focus more on the Musk Foundation especially because it was something that came up in my interview with Elon Musk at the beginning of this month.
Kids are worth it if at all possible. I’m planning to increase childcare benefits at my companies significantly.
Hopefully, other companies do same.
Also, Musk Foundation plans to donate directly to families.
Hopefully, details to be announced next month.
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) July 8, 2022
Poverty & Families
According to Invisible People TV, which shares stories of homeless people and families, the current face of homelessness is that of a child. Having been homeless as early as 9, this statistic hit home. When I saw Elon’s tweet about how the Musk Foundation will help families directly, this literally made my heart sing.
I grew up in poverty and I’ve been pretty fortunate. Living in and out of homeless shelters as a child, one learns that it’s a really harsh world out there. Single mothers are often shamed for having children and then being homeless. It was no different for my own mother.
This is why education and compassion are so important. We should never judge people over the situations they find themselves in. Families that are struggling need all the help they can get especially if they were abandoned by their own support systems.
How Will the Musk Foundation Help Families?
I don’t know but Elon Musk said on Twitter that hopefully, details would be released next month. I suspect he wants to focus on education. He also reminded me in our interview that we need to think beyond the United States when talking about poverty.
He’s absolutely correct in this respect. Millions of people worldwide experience poverty and here in the U.S., we are pretty fortunate that there are shelters, churches, and other organizations dedicated to helping people.
Importance of Literacy & Access To Internet
I think Elon will probably find a way to help families in need in many ways. Education is something that is important to him. During our interview, he spoke of literacy as a way to help solve poverty.
“Literacy and access to internet, I think, are fundamentally helpful. Really, we’ve got to think beyond the United States. There are billions of people who have no internet connectivity at all–nothing. Or it’s like a very low bandwidth and it’s insanely expensive. For many parts of the world, this is the case–billions of people.”
“So I think those things are helpful. Generally, education, obviously, is good. These days you can learn almost anything online. MIT, for example, has all of their lectures online and a number of other universities do. If you wanted to, you could learn almost anything for a very low cost just using a simple phone or an old tablet–a router box basically.”
Some Ideas
A lot of it comes down to spending habits of the parents as well.
— Tesla Owners Silicon Valley (@teslaownersSV) July 8, 2022
I do want to highlight what John said above. Another key contributor to poverty is the lack of financial literacy. Before I got involved with the Tesla community on Twitter, I knew nothing about stocks, investing, or crypto. Although I am clearly not an expert on these topics, I do know we often inherit our spending habits from our parents as well as the people around us.
I’ve worked hard to break that cycle, however, financial literacy and good spending habits should be commonly taught. I think that if the Musk Foundation really wants to help families, especially those who are struggling to make ends meet, perhaps Elon will consider financial literacy programs for families in homeless shelters as well as colleges and schools.
Helping Families Directly
Elon said the foundation would help families directly and this could mean a variety of things. One thing I know for sure is that Elon will make sure the money is well spent and does the most good. He told me,
“Well, we try hard with the foundation to give away money in ways that are actually useful whether it’s like a maximum number of cents on the dollar of actually helping the people in need.”
“It’s way harder to give away money than you think if you care about it actually doing good as opposed to sounding like it does good. It’s easy to make it sound like the money’s doing good but it’s hard to make actually do good.”
News
Tesla gamifies Supercharging with new ‘Charging Passport’
It will also include things like badges for special charging spots, among other metrics that will show all of the different places people have traveled to plug in for range.
Tesla is gamifying its Supercharging experience by offering a new “Charging Passport,” hoping to add a new layer to the ownership experience.
While it is not part of the Holiday Update, it is rolling out around the same time and offers a handful of cool new features.
Tesla’s Charging Passport will be available within the smartphone app and will give a yearly summary of your charging experience, helping encapsulate your travel for that year.
It will also include things like badges for special charging spots, among other metrics that will show all of the different places people have traveled to plug in for range.
Tesla has just introduced “Charging Passport,” a new yearly summary of your charging.
• Charging badges: Iconic Charging badge (for visiting places like the Tesla Diner, Oasis Supercharger, etc), Explorer badge, green saver badge, etc.
• Total unique Superchargers visited
•… pic.twitter.com/c1DHTWXpj7— Sawyer Merritt (@SawyerMerritt) December 8, 2025
Tesla will include the following metrics within the new Charging Passport option within the Tesla app:
- Charging badges: Iconic charging badges for visiting places like the Tesla Diner, Oasis Supercharger, etc., Explorer Badge, and more
- Total Unique Superchargers Visited
- Total Charging Sessions
- Total Miles Added during Charging Sessions
- Top Charging Day
- Longest Trip
- Favorite Charging Locations
This will give people a unique way to see their travels throughout the year, and although it is not necessarily something that is needed or adds any genuine value, it is something that many owners will like to look back on. After all, things like Spotify Wrapped and Apple Music Replay have been a great way for people to see what music they listened to throughout the year.
This is essentially Tesla’s version of that.
With a handful of unique Superchargers already active, Tesla is also building some new ones, like a UFO-inspired location in New Mexico, near Roswell.
Tesla is building a new UFO-inspired Supercharger in the heart of Alien country
News
Tesla launches its coolest gift idea ever just a few weeks after it was announced
“Gift one month of Full Self-Driving (Supervised), which allows the vehicle to drive itself almost anywhere with minimal intervention.”
Tesla has launched its coolest gift idea ever, just a few weeks after it was announced.
Tesla is now giving owners the opportunity to gift Full Self-Driving for one month to friends or family through a new gifting program that was suggested to the company last month.
The program will enable people to send a fellow Tesla owner one month of the company’s semi-autonomous driving software, helping them to experience the Full Self-Driving suite and potentially help Tesla gain them as a subscriber of the program, or even an outright purchase.
Tesla is going to allow owners to purchase an FSD Subscription for another owner for different month options
You’ll be able to gift FSD to someone! https://t.co/V29dhf5URj
— TESLARATI (@Teslarati) November 3, 2025
Tesla has officially launched the program on its Shop. Sending one month of Full Self-Driving costs $112:
“Gift one month of Full Self-Driving (Supervised), which allows the vehicle to drive itself almost anywhere with minimal intervention. All sales are final. Can only be purchased and redeemed in the U.S. This gift card is valued at $112.00 and is intended to cover the price of one month of FSD (Supervised), including up to 13% sales tax. It is not guaranteed to cover the full monthly price if pricing or tax rates change. This gift card can be stored in Tesla Wallet and redeemed toward FSD (Supervised) or any other Tesla product or service that accepts gift card payments.”
Tesla has done a great job of expanding Full Self-Driving access over the past few years, especially by offering things like the Subscription program, free trials through referrals, and now this gift card program.
Gifting Full Self-Driving is another iteration of Tesla’s “butts in seats” strategy, which is its belief that it can flip consumers to its vehicles and products by simply letting people experience them.
There is also a reason behind pushing Full Self-Driving so hard, and it has to do with CEO Elon Musk’s compensation package. One tranche requires Musk to achieve a certain number of active paid Full Self-Driving subscriptions.
More people who try the suite are likely to pay for it over the long term.
News
Tesla expands Robotaxi app access once again, this time on a global scale
Tesla said recently it plans to launch Robotaxi in Miami, Houston, Las Vegas, Phoenix, and Dallas.
Tesla has expanded Robotaxi app access once again, but this time, it’s on a much broader scale as the company is offering the opportunity for those outside of North America to download the app.
Tesla Robotaxi is the company’s early-stage ride-hailing platform that is active in Texas, California, and Arizona, with more expansion within the United States planned for the near future.
Tesla said recently it plans to launch Robotaxi in Miami, Houston, Las Vegas, Phoenix, and Dallas.
The platform has massive potential, and Tesla is leaning on it to be a major contributor to even more disruption in the passenger transportation industry. So far, it has driven over 550,000 miles in total, with the vast majority of this coming from the Bay Area and Austin.
First Look at Tesla’s Robotaxi App: features, design, and more
However, Tesla is focusing primarily on rapid expansion, but most of this is reliant on the company’s ability to gain regulatory permission to operate the platform in various regions. The expansion plans go well outside of the U.S., as the company expanded the ability to download the app to more regions this past weekend.
So far, these are the areas it is available to download in:
- Japan
- Thailand
- Hong Kong
- South Korea
- Australia
- Taiwan
- Macau
- New Zealand
- Mexico
- U.S.
- Canada
Right now, while Tesla is focusing primarily on expansion, it is also working on other goals that have to do with making it more widely available to customers who want to grab a ride from a driverless vehicle.
One of the biggest goals it has is to eliminate safety monitors from its vehicles, which it currently utilizes in Austin in the passenger’s seat and in the driver’s seat in the Bay Area.
A few weeks ago, Tesla started implementing a new in-cabin data-sharing system, which will help support teams assist riders without anyone in the front of the car.
Tesla takes a step towards removal of Robotaxi service’s safety drivers
As Robotaxi expands into more regions, Tesla stands to gain tremendously through the deployment of the Full Self-Driving suite for personal cars, as well as driverless Robotaxis for those who are just hailing rides.
Things have gone well for Tesla in the early stages of the Robotaxi program, but expansion will truly be the test of how things operate going forward. Navigating local traffic laws and gaining approval from a regulatory standpoint will be the biggest hurdle to jump.
Tesla gamifies Supercharging with new ‘Charging Passport’
Tesla launches its coolest gift idea ever just a few weeks after it was announced
