Tesla CEO Elon Musk said in an email to executives on Thursday that he has a "super bad feeling" about the economy as he announced that he would like to get rid of about 10% of the salaried workers at the electric car company. The email came titled "pause all hiring worldwide," and at that point, the company had some 5,000 job openings posted on LinkedIn.
The grim outlook appears to be from one of the most high-profile people so far to deliver such a blunt forecast.
JPMorgan Chase's CEO Jamie Dimon said recently that a "hurricane is right out there down the road coming our way," and he wasn't just talking about the weather.
The email, which was seen and reported on by Reuters, comes as Musk recently told employees they would be expected to return to the office. That message came with a veiled threat:
The previous email, which was reported on by CNN Business, said "Anyone who wishes to do remote work must be in the office for a minimum (and I mean *minimum*) of 40 hours per week or depart Tesla. This is less than we ask of factory workers." The email said, "If you don't show up, we will assume you have resigned."
As Reuters reported, Australian tech billionaire Scott Farquhar criticized the message to employees as "something out of the 1950s."
By the end of 2021, Tesla employed about 100,000 people, including within its subsidiaries, according to filings with the SEC.
