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If AI replaces workers, should it also pay taxes?

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Re: If AI replaces workers, should it also pay taxes?

#11

Post by smallmancontrov »

PaulKeeble wrote: post #4

Depends on whether they intend to let all of these out of work people who were unlucky enough to be born as a worker starve to death really. They are going to have to find a way to give people a life even if there are no jobs or the paperclip creation doesn't have any buyers. Anyone proposing to just leave a decent percentage of the country to just die is going to face stiff opposition.

Elon Musk hasn't taken to counting his Optimus bots in units of "legions" because he intends to let peasants tax him for ubi.

Re: If AI replaces workers, should it also pay taxes?

#12

Post by bofadeez »

varenc wrote: post #5
bofadeez wrote: post #2

No obviously not. Lots of machines replace workers. Why would taking scarce resources away from productive businesses and allocating to unproductive things be good for anyone other than government bureaucrats?

If full AGI dreams are achieved and 80% of jobs disappear, leading to mass unemployment, then we need to do something to support the huge numbers of people that no longer have any income. Taxes to support a UBI program seem one solution. Or maybe the labor market can shift to find opportunities for humans that AI can't replace and we'd avoid the mass unemployment. But feels like we're a long way from that right now.

We don't need taxes to pay a UBI.

If "every country" is in debt, who owns the debt exactly? ... (it's not real debt)

Re: If AI replaces workers, should it also pay taxes?

#14

Post by bofadeez »

xg15 wrote: post #10
bofadeez wrote: post #2

No obviously not. Lots of machines replace workers. Why would taking scarce resources away from productive businesses and allocating to unproductive things be good for anyone other than government bureaucrats?

Unproductive things like building roads, the electrical grid, water lines, schools, etc?

Fuel excise taxes (roads) and property taxes (local stuff)

Re: If AI replaces workers, should it also pay taxes?

#15

Post by smallmancontrov »

bofadeez wrote: post #2

No obviously not. Lots of machines replace workers. Why would taking scarce resources away from productive businesses and allocating to unproductive things be good for anyone other than government bureaucrats?

> productive

According to the economic notion of value, which is unique among definitions of "value" in being wealth-weighted, enshrining "mega gainz in brokerage accounts" as the ultimate social good while shrugging its shoulders at the plight of the ahem low-weight individual.

Re: If AI replaces workers, should it also pay taxes?

#16

Post by BurningFrog »

varenc wrote: post #5
bofadeez wrote: post #2

No obviously not. Lots of machines replace workers. Why would taking scarce resources away from productive businesses and allocating to unproductive things be good for anyone other than government bureaucrats?

If full AGI dreams are achieved and 80% of jobs disappear, leading to mass unemployment, then we need to do something to support the huge numbers of people that no longer have any income. Taxes to support a UBI program seem one solution. Or maybe the labor market can shift to find opportunities for humans that AI can't replace and we'd avoid the mass unemployment. But feels like we're a long way from that right now.

We have "disappeared" ~97% of jobs since the Industrial Revolution started, and no increased unemployment has materialized.

Until you understand how something that counter intuitive happened, you should not speculate on how AI replacing current jobs will play out!

Re: If AI replaces workers, should it also pay taxes?

#18

Post by bofadeez »

smallmancontrov wrote: post #15
bofadeez wrote: post #2

No obviously not. Lots of machines replace workers. Why would taking scarce resources away from productive businesses and allocating to unproductive things be good for anyone other than government bureaucrats?

> productive According to the economic notion of value, which is unique among definitions of "value" in being wealth-weighted, enshrining "mega gainz in brokerage accounts" as the ultimate social good while shrugging its shoulders at the plight of the ahem low-weight individual.

Value isn’t something society measures or adds up by people’s bank balances; it’s just how much each individual personally wants something, and markets show this only through voluntary choices, not by declaring rich people’s gains more important than poor people’s lives.

Re: If AI replaces workers, should it also pay taxes?

#20

Post by WillAdams »

bofadeez wrote: post #12
varenc wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If full AGI dreams are achieved and 80% of jobs disappear, leading to mass unemployment, then we need to do something to support the huge numbers of people that no longer have any income. Taxes to support a UBI program seem one solution. Or maybe the labor market can shift to find opportunities for humans that AI can't replace and we'd avoid the mass unemployment. But feels like we're a long way from that right now.

We don't need taxes to pay a UBI. If "every country" is in debt, who owns the debt exactly? ... (it's not real debt)

The problem with socialism, is eventually, one runs out of other people's money.

For an example of what unlimited borrowing and money printing results in, look up Germany in 1921--1923

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