The future of transport and global society

I must admit that I really did not understand the geoeconomic importance of the radical technological transformations now taking place in the auto industry until a cashier at a café in Chicago asked me, “Oh, you’re from France? How did you get to Chicago? Did you fly or drive?

Perhaps she was a visionary who envisioned cars that could either sail or fly across the Atlantic? I know some entrepreneurs are attempting to produce Batman cars that turn into boats or that can even fly—but I certainly did not own one!

The Fourth Industrial Revolution—driven by Artificial Intelligence, Big Data, and Robotics—is transforming everything, including the auto industry. This revolution is not just technical. It’s economic, social, geopolitical, and personal.

I told my son-in-law to buy a hybrid, not a Tesla—too expensive, impractical in cold climates, with poor suspension, and not enough charging stations. He bought a Tesla anyway. Then he sold it at a loss just before people were beginning to scratch and burn them in protesting Musk’s role in the highly inefficient Department of Government Efficiency... and bought a hybrid. Oh well… Who listens to old farts?

Crisis in the auto industry

The auto industry faces a deep crisis. Global auto production in 2025 is forecast to fall 2% to 87.9 million vehicles, with North America down as much as 9%. Trump’s 2025 tariff hikes—especially on European imports—threaten billions in losses.

And the rivalry is not simply between the US and the Europeans. Beijing is in the action too, outcompeting automakers on both continents!

China’s BYD Electric Vehicles (EVs) now outsell EVs of Tesla. BYD offers cheaper, longer-range models that perform in sub-zero temperatures and can travel up to 649 miles on a single charge. Moreover, BYD has announced the development of an electric battery charging system that can fully power up a vehicle within minutes. And another Chinese EV manufacturer, Xpeng, plans to mass market its Mona series in Europe in 2026―in competition with automakers like BMW and Mercedes, if not Tesla itself.

To deal with the China challenge, US tariffs on Chinese Electric Vehicles (EVs) have been raised to 100%, while EU tariffs have been increased up to 45%. Tariffs have also been extended to steel and auto parts, including semiconductors and batteries; export restrictions (on chipmaking tools, for example) are additionally fragmenting trade in the auto and other industries.

All this means that EV prices could rise by thousands of dollars and result in significant job losses. Manufacturing costs could mount anywhere from $4,000 to $12,000. Automakers will probably pass much of that cost on to consumers in the form of higher prices.

Biden had backed EV infrastructure and tax credits, but Trump vowed to roll those subsidies back—while ignoring heavy subsidies for gas, oil, and nuclear energies. In May 2025, the Senate blocked California’s 2035 ban on new gas cars, with Trump expected to sign.

The failed Trump-Musk bromance

It had been a strange alliance―a “bromance” that could not last. Trump has backed gas-guzzling cars, fossil fuels, and shale gas: “Drill, baby, drill.” Musk champions solar energy and EVs.

Given falling sales, Tesla’s market cap fell $380 billion despite its reliance on China for 40% of revenue. Musk’s EV empire needs to radically reinvent its Tesla models and raise capital from a skeptical Wall Street. His spat with Trump won’t help!

The apparent techno-economic decline of Musk’s “fake” Tesla versus Chinese BYD competition (and others) means that millions of jobs are at stake in the US and global economies.

If the US can’t soon catch up with China’s innovations and finance, US carmakers may truly enter into a “Death Spiral”!

The EU and China

And while Musk and Trump battled it out, the European Union moved in its own direction.

Confronted with a trade war, the EU, once a global auto leader, faces supply chain disruptions in addition to being confronted with a shift from gas-powered to software-defined vehicles. The auto sector drives 40% of Europe’s semiconductor demand, 75% of its battery sales, and contributes €1.7 trillion in value added.

In response to Chinese competition, the EU placed up to 45% tariffs on Chinese EVs, while the US had placed 100% tariffs, in an effort to protect their respective US and EU domestic industries. And some EV production may shift to Europe: Chinese firms are exploring European production sites, such as in Hungary, while also looking to non-EU member Turkey.

Initially, the EU had mirrored US tariffs on Chinese EVs, prompting Beijing to tax EU goods like French cognac. Yet after Trump’s “Liberation Day” tariffs, China and the EU resumed talks. China subsequently eased some tariffs on Europe, and the EU considered replacing EV tariffs with minimum pricing.

This Sino-European dialogue raised the prospect that U.S. trade pressure could push China and Europe into closer political-economic cooperation—that could possibly lead to closer cooperation in sales of military technology.

Geo-economic tensions and the new space race

The revolution in the auto industry is playing out in both the domestic and the global arena―including outer space.

A new “space race” is underway—between Elon Musk’s Starlink and Jeff Bezos’s Project Kuiper. The space race, joined by the Europeans, Russians, Chinese, Indians, and Japanese, is for control of outer space and global communication that can permit cars and trucks—and militaries—to intercommunicate.

It’s much like Edison vs. Westinghouse in the “war of currents” between Direct Current (DC) and Alternating Current (AC) all over again. Yet this time, it’s all about controlling the internet and global communications.

Initially, Musk thought he was winning―until his “bromance” with Trump ended in a nasty divorce, putting $22 billion of SpaceX contracts with the US government at risk―if Trump and Musk can not kiss and make up!

For their part, Musk and Bezos want humans to colonize Mars and outer space using space-age vehicles—in rivalry with China and Russia! Musk wants us to live on Mars to escape World War III on Earth, but in fact, the urge to colonize Mars is just an extraterritorial facet of an ongoing confrontation on Earth!

If Homines geopolitici et economici cannot soon establish peace on earth, the ongoing wars will simply expand further into outer space. And the planet Mars will finally live up to its name!

Scramble for resources

Obtaining resources from Mars and the Moon is years away; yet there’s another resource race taking place on the ground that adds to the competition for the search for oil, gas, and shale gas, and the drive to develop solar and wind as well as fission and fusion energies.

This new resource and energy race is for control of lithium, cobalt, and at least 17 rare earths needed to power electric vehicles and smartphones. This demand has launched a new global scramble, often at the expense of the environment, poor working conditions, and human rights, and that can result in nasty wars and coup d’etats. Exploiting mines in the Democratic Republic of Congo and in Bolivia, not to overlook deforestation and heavily polluted waters—all for smartphones and EVs.

The problem: Until the early 2000s, the United States, Japan, and the European Union were the primary markets for battery minerals. However, Beijing has since overtaken them all. Between 2017 and 2022, China accounted for 87% of global lithium imports, 70% of bauxite and nickel imports, 63% of manganese and copper imports, and 53% of cobalt imports.

China now dominates the global value chains of these minerals, both upstream, by controlling supply sources, and downstream, through refining processes. As a result, Chinese firms process an average of 80% of the non-ferrous metals used in electric vehicle batteries worldwide.

With rare-earth shortages keeping U.S. EV production dependent on China and foreign sources, President Biden sought rare-earth deals with Australia. President Trump now seeks rare earth deals with Canada, Greenland, Rwanda, and the Democratic Republic of Congo.

Trump even insisted on a rare earth deal with Ukraine in the midst of its war with Russia. Yet Moscow subsequently seized the valuable lithium deposits of the Dobra lithium fields near Shevchenko in western Donetsk. The loss is a crucial one for Kyiv because such resources were supposed to maintain Washington’s interest in providing some undefined form of US security guarantees for Ukraine.

At the same time, a two-faced Trump may also be looking for rare earth and other deals with Russia, among other countries as well. Then again, the US could even become self-sufficient in recycled lithium!

From Ford’s assembly line to algorithmic automation

In the Second Industrial Revolution, Henry Ford changed the world by mass-producing cars on an assembly line. But, as a member of the Hitler fan club, he didn’t double wages because he was a nice guy and generous—he did it because job turnover was sky-high. Employees couldn’t take the repetitive work. Ford’s factories needed three workers for every job in a single year.

Fast forward: the Third Industrial Revolution brought automation and computing. Now, Homines geopolitici et economici is entering the Fourth Industrial Revolution—where AI, big data, algorithms, and robotics are reshaping the nature of work and the workforce entirely.

Unlike Ford’s era, today’s technologies do not necessarily boost wages. Instead, they risk replacing even highly skilled workers. AI and robotics are not just a threat to autoworkers, truck drivers, and cabbies. They are also aimed at programmers, designers, lawyers, and even AI developers themselves.

As Fiverr’s CEO, Micha Kaufman, bluntly told employees, it’s not a matter of if, but when. It does not matter if you are a programmer, designer, product manager, data scientist, lawyer, customer support rep, salesperson, or a finance person—AI is coming for you.

Fiverr’s firm is symbolic of the new era that promises a multinational online marketplace for subcontracting and freelance services. Its model appears to be reinforcing the trend toward the new “precariat”—qualified employees who lack job security and must accept intermittent employment or underemployment. This means that people will change jobs more often or juggle multiple jobs, as they will be caught in unstable, algorithm-driven employment. The auto industry is just one of the industries to be transformed.

The deeper question: who benefits?

And what happens to labor? Auto factory workers and other related jobs are threatened by automation and robots that can work longer and harder, and more efficiently than humans.

Taxi drivers have been forced to compete with Uber’s gig economy, which is a service for those who may not own cars. Some taxi drivers still pay outrageous fees for medallions that give drivers the right to drive a taxi while also paying for regulatory fees for insurance and licensing. It is no wonder that taxi strikes have been protesting against Uber and have threatened, for example, to block my taxi from going to the CDG airport in France twice!

And just wait for what happens when taxis no longer need human drivers. We used to call them “horseless carriages.” Now we’re moving to “human-less” vehicles. In 2018, the autonomous vehicle market was worth $5.6 billion. By 2035, it could reach up to $400 billion.

Driverless trucks and ride-hailing fleets are already being tested: A long-haul truck from Newark to Chicago currently costs $2,200. A driverless electric truck convoy could make the same run for just $70. That’s not innovation. That’s disruption.

In 2018, the autonomous vehicle market was valued at $5.6 billion. Yet in the very near future, automatic driving and advanced driver-assistance systems (ADAS) could possibly generate between $300 billion and $400 billion in the passenger car market by 2035.

The implications? Massive changes in employment, supply chains, trade, and the transport of goods and supplies.

Ethical questions should also be raised: If confronted with a dangerous situation in which the AI decision maker must make a choice between risking the passenger’s life in a driverless vehicle versus the life of a pedestrian or another driver, what action should AI be programmed for?

And what will be the insurance costs? A jury ordered Tesla to pay more than $240 million after an Autopilot crash in Florida. Tesla claimed it did not possess the data related to the crash until a hacker found it. The dirt is only beginning to build up…

CEO pay

In addition to the ethical questions, what about the social ones?

The crisis is also about inequality and economic dislocation—and whether technology will serve all of humanity or rule from above and leave most of us humans behind.

Behind this techno- and massive ego-drama is a more profound question: Will this revolution enrich society, or just enrich the CEOs of major corporations who have seen their pay soar by over 900% since 1970—even as industrial performance stagnates? As Fortune Magazine put it succinctly: “Clearly, increased CEO pay has not been driving performance up.”

Before 1970, the real value of large firms grew at their highest rate of 6.1% per year, yet their CEO pay growth was 0.1% per year. Yet after 1970, the growth in large firms’ real value declined considerably to 5.2% per year—while their real CEO pay increased by 4.6% per year (921% total through 2022).

In other words, executives are getting huge bonuses and stock buybacks even for very poor performance, while blaming labor and cutting benefits—when it is the employees, not shareholders, who deliver the revenues and profits!

While the income of US automotive CEOs may actually be more than the following estimates due to stock ownership and other income, in 2024, GM’s CEO received $29.5 million in total compensation, which was approximately 362 times the median GM employee's income; Stellantis's CEO compensation was over $24 million, which was 350 times the average worker's salary of around $68,600, while Stellantis also slashed employee stock ownership funds; and the Ford CEO earned approximately $24.9 million, while the median Ford employee compensation was $98,273, making the CEO’s total compensation about 253 times the median employee compensation. In 2024, the Uber CEO earned about 424 times more than the company's median employee. And Elon Musk could become the first trillionaire―if he meets difficult to achieve targets of a new Tesla pay plan―but at a time when Tesla is not doing well in Europe and elsewhere.

Under Trump, the income and benefits gap is expected to grow wider, given even greater tax advantages granted to the rich while his tariff policies make the average American and the much of the world pay for the $918.4 billion overall U.S. trade deficit (about 3.1 percent of gross domestic product), the outrageous $1.9 trillion US budget deficit and the US public debt that is presently larger than the nation's annual economic output and expected to exceed $52 trillion by the end of fiscal 2035―now given an additional boost by Trump’s “One Big Beautiful Bill”

The world’s wealthiest CEO, Elon Musk, is the prime example of the new plutocracy whose power and influence are not only impacting the direction of the US and global auto industry but also impacting the politics, budget, economics, culture, and military-technological affairs of the US and other countries around the world.

Not all members of the exclusive new plutocratic club see eye to eye on domestic and global affairs, but they generally do not believe in sharing their wealth—even if others helped them to earn it!

Much as Plato had warned way back in 400 BC, rule by plutocracy generally results in an ever-increasing gap in wealth and power between the rich and relatively poor—a dynamic that potentially results in both domestic and international conflict.

Conclusion: the real test is political, not technological

But don’t fret! At least some of the big guys will fall when the Capo dei Capi of Artificial Intelligence takes control!

Homines geopolitici et economici are approaching a future where even managers and executives, and not just lowly employees, could be replaced by artificial intelligence and by robots that are absurdly called “living AI.” The tools we build today may end up running the companies—and the world—while the rest of us are left scrambling for jobs in the existential search for life’s meaning.

Charlie Chaplin had satirized the Second Industrial Revolution in his great film, Modern Times. But the Fourth Industrial Revolution appears to be making even more profound transmogrifications.

Will the Fourth Industrial Revolution prove to be more creative or more destructive? With more promise? Or more peril?

Let me end where much of this all began—with the real Nikola Tesla. A man of genius, who dreamed of wireless communication, remote control, drones, and lasers. His foresight laid the foundation for smart devices and smart cars―but who died in poverty.

Nikola Tesla is only Elon Musk’s second-place hero because it was Edison, not Tesla, who “brought his stuff to market and made those inventions accessible to the world.” Tesla may not have “won” success and money in his lifetime, but his ideas have come to define the high-tech world, even if he was a mere “loser” in monetary terms in the views of both Trump and Musk.

But herein lie the roots of the coming crisis. The very way industry implements the new technologies will impact not only our livelihoods and the way we work, but also our personal, domestic, and international social, cultural, and political relationships.

As outrageous socio-economic inequities are literally widening minute by minute, Homines geopolitici et economici will need to avert the real possibility of wider and more intense domestic and international conflict with bold, thoughtful leadership and action. The challenge is not just to invent but to invent and invest wisely in ways that benefit everyone.

The struggle to significantly lower the pay gap between CEOs and average workers, to obtain meaningful and decent-paying employment, better health insurance, better child care, educational opportunities, and old-age pensions, and wider distribution of employee stock ownership is only just beginning. And such goals cannot be achieved without more meaningful employee participation in decision-making processes on all levels of the enterprise.

A new political order should encourage “CEO decisions that take into account the long-term health of the planet and the interests of all corporate stakeholders, including consumers, employees, and their communities.” And consumers, employees, and their communities should all be engaged in those decisions!

The true test of this Fourth Industrial Revolution isn’t just technological. It’s political. It’s social. It’s all too human.