OpenAI CEO Sam Altman has\u00a0floated the idea that the United States government should become a stockholder in artificial intelligence companies. Yes, actually own shares of the thriving major AI companies!<\/p>\n
Of course, it is not without precedent that the feds assume partial ownership of private companies. Benjamin D. Connard of Carnegie Investments reports<\/a> that recent federal holdings have included the nearly $9\u00a0billion investment in Intel to boost its chip-making efforts, a 15\u00a0percent share of NVIDIA and Advanced Micro Devices chip sales to China to help keep China dependent on U.S. technologies, and the Pentagon\u2019s $400\u00a0million equity stake in MP Materials, a rare-earth miner.<\/p>\n These recent investments differ from the massive auto industry and bank bailouts in the past\u2014those were to distressed companies on the verge of collapse whose failure threatened the entire U.S. economy and differ from a stake in the strategically important computer chip and rare-earth resource sectors. The move suggested by Altman in the contemporary technology market could build a national AI investment vehicle or sovereign wealth fund<\/a>. That is new and would take congressional action.<\/p>\n Most Popular Stories<\/p>\n Most Popular<\/p>\n Altman\u2019s concept is that companies such as OpenAI, Anthropic, Google, Meta and other leaders in the field would share 5\u00a0percent of their valuation with the American public through the U.S. government. Russell Brandom, writing in TechCrunch<\/a>, explained the ties to the American people:<\/p>\n \u201cMost recently, a policy paper titled \u2018Industrial Policy for the Intelligence Age,\u2019 released by OpenAI in April, proposed a public wealth fund that could invest directly in AI labs and companies deploying their technology. \u2018Returns from the Fund could be distributed directly to citizens, allowing more people to participate directly in the upside of AI-driven growth, regardless of their starting wealth or access to capital,\u2019 the document reads. A more aggressive version of the policy was proposed by Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) in June, calling for a one-time 50%\u00a0tax on AI company stock, with the collected shares being deposited into a public wealth fund. The bill, called the American AI Sovereign Wealth Fund Act, would apply to all \u2018systemically important\u2019 AI companies, including those dealing with data centers, infrastructure, or robotics. Under the proposal, companies like Google and SpaceX that include AI as only part of their business would be allowed to spin off non-AI portions of the company to avoid taxation.\u201d<\/p>\n The background on this move is key to understanding how the federal government might be able to respond to the widely predicted AI-induced job shakeout expected to come in the next five years<\/a>. The concern is growing as we approach 2030 that tens of millions of Americans will be impacted by job losses or pay reductions due to businesses employing AI for efficiency reasons to replace human workers. The question is, how can one find a way to extract funds from those who stand to make billions of dollars in providing AI substitutions for the workers who stand to lose their jobs?<\/p>\n Reportedly, Altman\u2019s latest proposal is loosely based on the Alaska Permanent Fund Dividend<\/a>. That fund, unique to the state of Alaska, distributes a portion of the state\u2019s oil and mineral royalties, which are invested in the Alaska Permanent Fund. The yearly payout<\/a> varies depending on the fund\u2019s investment performance. As Wikipedia describes it<\/a>, \u201cThe PFD is a basic income in the form of a resource dividend. Some researchers argue, \u2018It has helped Alaska attain the highest economic equality of any state in the United States\u00a0\u2026 And, seemingly unnoticed, it has provided unconditional cash assistance to needy Alaskans at a time when most states have scaled back aid and increased conditionality.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n A similar universal basic income concept as it might be applied to the AI economy harks back to Sam Altman and others who had in the past suggested that AI corporations\u2019 profits could become a primary source of revenue sharing to supplement all residents\u2019 income. Basic annual income (often called base salary or base pay) is a fixed amount of money that residents or citizens might receive in a 12-month period before any taxes, benefits or deductions are applied. It excludes variable compensation such as overtime, bonuses or commissions.<\/p>\n Matt Wolfe, who blogs and curates AI news, expert commentary, top tools and exclusive interviews weekly, in Future Tools describes his uneasy reaction to Altman\u2019s proposal<\/a>:<\/p>\n \u201cOpenAI just floated an idea that sounds great in theory but has me a little uneasy in practice. According to a Financial Times report, OpenAI has proposed giving the U.S. government a 5% ownership stake in the company worth roughly $42.6\u00a0billion based on OpenAI\u2019s most recent $852\u00a0billion valuation. Sam Altman\u2019s pitch is that if AI creates massive economic upside, the public should share in it, modeled loosely on the Alaska Permanent Fund (where the state\u2019s oil revenue gets invested and pays annual dividends to every resident). Altman also wants other major AI labs\u2014Anthropic, Google, Meta, xAI\u2014to each contribute a similar 5% stake to the same public wealth fund. A few context points that matter here: This isn\u2019t happening in a vacuum. The government has been ramping up pressure on AI companies for months.\u201d<\/p>\n