You can always rely on Senator Bernie Sanders (I-VT), the daffy old Bolshevik from Vermont, for one thing: He insists on introducing all manner of socialist horse squeeze as proposed legislation. Lately, he’s been constantly whining about the need for a wealth tax, proving that he doesn’t understand Article I, Section 9, Clause 4 of the U.S. Constitution, much less why the 16th Amendment was necessary to implement the income tax. But then, the far Left has always seen the Constitution as something to be dodged, in any case.
Now, though, Senator Sanders has a new idea, and it would make old Karl Marx clap his hands in glee: Seizing 50 percent of the ownership of all Artificial Intelligence (AI) companies and putting the assets into a sovereign wealth fund. (Yeah, like that would last.)
A U.S. Senate bill would give the federal government a 50% ownership stake in the largest artificial intelligence companies, creating a sovereign wealth fund its sponsor estimates would be worth $7 trillion. One policy analyst called the idea “nutty” while others said it would put American AI companies at a combative disadvantage and would lead to offshoring.
Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., introduced the American AI Sovereign Wealth Fund Act, which would impose a one-time 50% tax on AI company stock and deposit those shares into a fund that could pay every American more than $1,000 annually.
Sanders said AI was built on “the collective knowledge of humanity and the creative work of tens of millions of people” and that the public deserves a direct ownership stake in the companies that have profited from it.
Here’s the first thing that Senator Sanders gets wrong: AI wasn’t built solely on “the collective knowledge of humanity and the creative work of tens of millions of people”, although that’s certainly a factor. But AI is also built by the thousands of programmers who write and maintain the software, not to mention all the people involved with building and maintaining the physical assets of the big data centers required. Sanders’ bill would, in effect, yank away half of the results of their efforts by partially nationalizing an entire industry.
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But wait! There’s more! Senator Sanders is also, as has been proven in virtually every policy position he has ever taken, utterly incapable of understanding how incentives matter. Some of these software companies have tremendous assets, and any move in the United States to partially nationalize their industry would simply force many, if not most, of these companies to flee the USA for greener pastures.
Fortunately for the American economy, Senator Sanders’ ideas rarely gain much traction; in fact, when it comes to traction, the daffy old Bolshevik’s ideas are about as stable as a hog on greased ice. That’s to our very good fortune, as Americans.
Now, a sovereign wealth fund isn’t, by itself, the worst idea ever. We have a state-level equivalent here in Alaska, sort of, in the form of the Permanent Fund, from which every Alaskan receives a dividend every year. But the Permanent Fund isn’t based on taxing away half of any one industry’s assets; and if you believe that, even if this passed, it would truly be a “one-time” tax, then I have a bridge in Brooklyn to sell you. No, if they did it once, they would do it again. That’s how these people work. You can count on it.
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