Before he became the richest man in the world, Elon Musk set out to prove something to himself—that if all his bold ideas failed, he could still survive in America. Literally.

In a 2015 interview with astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson on StarTalk Radio, Musk reflected on his early mindset, revealing just how far he went to test his personal threshold for survival. At the time, he had already founded Tesla and SpaceX, but the conversation turned to a much earlier phase in his life—just after college, when he first arrived in the U.S.

"In America, it's pretty easy to keep yourself alive," Musk told Tyson. "So my threshold for existing is pretty low. I figure I could be in some dingy apartment with my computer and be okay and not starve."

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So that's exactly what he tested. Musk challenged himself to live on just $1 a day for food. His grocery list? Hot dogs, oranges, pasta, and bulk green peppers with a big jar of sauce.

"You get really tired of hot dogs and oranges after a while," he admitted, laughing. "And of course pasta and a green pepper and a big thing of sauce. That can go pretty far, too."

He wasn't trying to impress anyone—he just wanted to prove that even if every business venture failed, he wouldn't. "If I can live for a dollar a day, then at least from a food cost standpoint, well it's pretty easy to earn like $30 in a month anyway, so I'll probably be okay."

Musk immigrated to the U.S. from South Africa in the mid-1990s, during his early twenties. By 1995, after earning degrees in physics and economics from the University of Pennsylvania, he co-founded his first startup, Zip2. Back then, money was so tight that he and his brother Kimbal slept in the office and showered at the local YMCA.

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At the time, a dollar stretched further. In the mid-90s, the average cost of a loaf of bread was under $1, and hot dogs ran about $1.29 per pound. By comparison, the average cost of hot dogs today has soared to over $5.22 per pound. Inflation has made Musk's once-thrifty diet virtually impossible to replicate. Even pasta—once a budget staple—is now often $1.50 to $2 a box, and fresh produce prices have more than doubled since his college days.

Now, decades later, he controls some of the most valuable companies in the world and has an estimated net worth topping $340 billion, according to Forbes and Bloomberg. But that extreme frugality never really left him. 

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Today, spending just $1 a day on food in America seems laughable, especially with inflation and rising grocery prices. According to the U.S. Department of Agriculture, the average cost of food per person per month in 2024 was over $300—even on a thrifty plan.

So yes, Musk once lived off hot dogs and oranges. Not because he had to. Because he needed to know he could.

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