The Big Picture: Elon Musk reportedly plans to fire 75% of Twitter’s employees

The world's richest man and CEO of Tesla, Elon Musk, is grudgingly gearing up for Twitter acquisition. But it isn't all that good news for people at Twitter. Once Musk takes over, reports say he's planning some major layoffs. However, there's more to the story. 

Twitterati claims that Musk is trying to hide his own "vulnerability" with the Twitter deal fiasco with the headlines. 

What did the report say? Washington Post reported that Elon Musk informed prospective investors that he plans to fire a staggering 75% of Twitter's employees to improve the company's financial standing. 

• Twitter currently has around 7,500 employees and a 75% cut would bring the number down to just around 2,000.
• Under Musk, Twitter plans to slash the company's payroll by $800 million by the end of 2023.

The BIG Picture: Not everyone is convinced of Elon Musk's supposed "threats". Some claim that Musk is trying to hide his own vulnerability with the sensational headlines. 

Elon Musk, who seemingly can’t afford to buy Twitter and is under federal investigation for his failing bid to buy Twitter, is now trying to distract everyone from his weakness and vulnerability by threatening to lay off 75% of Twitter employees – a company he doesn’t even own.

— Palmer Report (@PalmerReport) October 20, 2022

• Reportedly, Elon Musk's Twitter deal has hit a new snag. US government officials are discussing whether to subject some of Musk's ventures including Starlink and the Twitter deal to a national security review. 
• A few weeks ago, the "terminally online" CEO made some questionable comments on the Ukraine-Russia war which seemed to put a pro-Russia stance. 
• It's not just Musk's tweets, but Biden officials seemed to be particularly concerned about the Twitter deal involving multiple foreign investors. 
• The investors include Saudi Arabia's Prince Alwaleed bin Talal, Chinese Canadian Changpeng Zhao's cryptocurrency company Binance and a Qatari sovereign fund. 
• However, it wouldn't be the first time Musk came under the radar of the Pentagon. He came under scrutiny of the Pentagon for smoking marijuana on Joe Rogan's podcast in 2018 due to a NASA contract. 

How is Elon Musk going to say that he would cut nearly 75 percent of Twitter's staff when there hasn’t been any final decisions on buying twitter? He is just as much of an egotistical narcissist as Trump.

— David Weissman (@davidmweissman) October 21, 2022

There's more to the story: Twitter already had plans to cut down the size of its workforce, but not by the enormous margin reportedly quoted by Elon Musk. 

• While Musk plans to "authenticate all humans" on Twitter to weed out the bots, that he's become obsessed with, he had not presented any plan on how to achieve this goal. 
• Moreover, if there are massive cuts in workforce, there are fears it may clash with the aim of battling the bots. 
• The layoffs will reportedly include key infrastructure like data centers that is likely to affect Twitter's ability to police information and battle security risks for its users. 
• On the other hand, there are problems brewing at Tesla. Investors are reportedly concerned over demand and economic issues. 

The Twitter deal: After proposing to buy Twitter, making it official, backing out, getting sued, going to court, and finally agreeing to the original deal, Elon Musk's Twitter acquisition has looked like a battle of ego - one person's ego. 

Now, Musk must fulfill the Twitter deal by October 28. It needs to be seen whether Musk actually takes over Twitter, whether Biden officials launch a review and whether Musk actually fires more than half of Twitter's employees.