The $US1 trillion ($1.5 trillion) pay package the Tesla board has proposed for Elon Musk is one of those jaw-dropping statistics that takes some time for people to come to grips with.

Already the world’s richest man, the proposed compensation package would be worth more than the GDP of all but the 20 largest countries in the world. Obscene, disgusting or vulgar can’t begin to describe the notion of awarding one person that level of compensation for leading a company.

Elon Musk could be become the one-trillion-dollar man.Credit: AP

This is one for the history books, even for the US where corporate pay packets can run into the hundreds of millions. This remuneration package, devised by the Australian who chairs Tesla – Robyn Denholm – sits miles outside the bell curve.

The obvious question here is whether any person could be worth that much? If the answer to that question is no, then readers will be baffled by how investors reacted to the news of Musk’s proposed pay packet – Tesla shares went up 3 per cent.

The reason for that is,........

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