Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

The Public Should Own Half of the Big A.I. Companies

sanders.senate.gov

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

141–150 of 290 posts

Re: The Public Should Own Half of the Big A.I. Companies

#141

Post by triceratops »

rayiner wrote: post #15

Why does the public have a right to expropriate the property if AI companies specifically, as opposed to other types of companies? Just make broad rules that apply to everyone based on abstract principles. I’m fine even with very liberal economic approaches. If we want to raise corporate tax rates to 30%, fine, do that. Want to get creative? Half the equity of every company goes into a public fund. But this case by c…

> Want to get creative? Half the equity of every company goes into a public fund.

Half is far too much but that is an amazing idea. Especially if it is used to reduce income taxes.

Re: The Public Should Own Half of the Big A.I. Companies

#142

Post by nradov »

pesus wrote: post #124
nradov wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are lots of new jobs in building data centers, plus all the components that go into those. For example, worldwide employee count at Amphenol is way up over the past couple years. They make a lot of electrical connectors and similar items.

Temporary construction and manufacturing jobs are not actual replacements for the jobs lost. They'll be done after the data centers are built, and then we're just back to AI having destroyed tons of jobs with no replacements.

Construction is never "done". New stuff is always being built. And eventually the old data centers will be demolished or remodeled, which also takes a huge amount of labor.

I think a lot of HN users still somehow don't understand the "lump of labor" fallacy.

https://www.stlouisfed.org/publications/page-one-economics/2...

Re: The Public Should Own Half of the Big A.I. Companies

#143

Post by fourseventy »

triceratops wrote: post #95
Aunche wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The oil is on Alaska/Norway's land, so they can choose what they want to do with money from selling that oil including distributing it or purchasing assets. Sanders seem to be proposing to arbitrarily seize half of the companies.

> Sanders seem to be proposing to arbitrarily seize half of the companies. I guess it's only ok when the government arbitrarily seizes half my paycheck. If it happens to billionaires it's communism or something.

This isn't about income tax or capital gains tax, it's about the government seizing half of a privately owned company.

Re: The Public Should Own Half of the Big A.I. Companies

#144

Post by triceratops »

fourseventy wrote: post #143
triceratops wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Sanders seem to be proposing to arbitrarily seize half of the companies. I guess it's only ok when the government arbitrarily seizes half my paycheck. If it happens to billionaires it's communism or something.

This isn't about income tax or capital gains tax, it's about the government seizing half of a privately owned company.

In both cases the government takes half of something that belongs to an individual. Does it matter if it's cash or stock?

Re: The Public Should Own Half of the Big A.I. Companies

#145

Post by jdgoesmarching »

solatic wrote: post #115

The public should own more than half. Via the stock market. Where public shareholders can vote in elections to control the Board of Directors, and elect Directors that act in the fiduciary interests of shareholders, and return excess capital to shareholders by issuing dividends. Where any member of the public can decide to buy or sell shares, being the most important development in the democratization of wealth devel…

This comment really drives home the effective propaganda of “publicly owned” as a term.

Concentrated ownership of the wealthy is not synonymous with “the public.” You are very literally arguing for plutocracy over democracy.

Re: The Public Should Own Half of the Big A.I. Companies

#146

Post by fourseventy »

triceratops wrote: post #141
rayiner wrote: post #15

Why does the public have a right to expropriate the property if AI companies specifically, as opposed to other types of companies? Just make broad rules that apply to everyone based on abstract principles. I’m fine even with very liberal economic approaches. If we want to raise corporate tax rates to 30%, fine, do that. Want to get creative? Half the equity of every company goes into a public fund. But this case by c…

> Want to get creative? Half the equity of every company goes into a public fund. Half is far too much but that is an amazing idea. Especially if it is used to reduce income taxes.

No its full blown communist.

Re: The Public Should Own Half of the Big A.I. Companies

#147

Post by triceratops »

fourseventy wrote: post #146
triceratops wrote: post #141

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Want to get creative? Half the equity of every company goes into a public fund. Half is far too much but that is an amazing idea. Especially if it is used to reduce income taxes.

No its full blown communist.

That's just a label. You can call anything communist. What makes this specific idea bad?

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48387551

Re: The Public Should Own Half of the Big A.I. Companies

#148

Post by Fraterkes »

csallen wrote: post #39

I strongly dislike the belief that people should be compensated when others find ingenious ways to profit off of publicly-available data. We live in a world where "creating value" (doing things that others find helpful) and "capturing value" (getting those people to pay you money) are two different things. If I give my mom a hug, I'm creating value, but that's not necessarily something I'm going to charge her for it.…

But isn't that exactly what's going on here? An ai-company has created value by developing these models, and the public should capture that value via the instrument of government.

Re: The Public Should Own Half of the Big A.I. Companies

#149

Post by pokstad »

If the public wants to own half of the AI company, then they should invest enough to buy half of it. Taking private property away without compensation is stealing. What the government did with Intel where they got 10% in stock was a bit better because Intel got money.

Re: The Public Should Own Half of the Big A.I. Companies

#150

Post by [deleted] »

lostmsu wrote: post #111
TehCorwiz wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If I can go to jail over it then they should too. Let's not judge them by some imaginary ideal world while judging individuals by the present crushing reality.

But you can not. At least not in US. Basically, you can not go to jail for it almost anywhere.

[deleted]
Post reply on HN