Sam Altman falls out of love with universal basic income

MattDaEskimo•about 4 hours ago

This makes sense.

Initially, the focus was consumer use of AI. People needed to feel safe, they needed to feel part of something better.

Now, the focus is enterprises, and they need to know that their tokens aren't going to spike in price from taxes

hgoel•about 4 hours ago

He wouldn't want to be accused of actually believing in anything

smashmiek•about 4 hours ago

Fickle Clown Economics

fallingfrog•about 3 hours ago

Sam Altman is willing to roll the dice on human extinction in order to make a buck. Even though hes already outrageously rich.

I feel that I cannot properly voice my feelings about him without being banned from hacker news.

timoth3y•about 4 hours ago

talk is cheap, so what is he doing today to make that happen? Is he supporting NGOs or politicians focused on making this happen, or is he just musing that it would be nice? (I honestly don't know, but I've only seen the non-committal musing.)

There is this ongoing flack in our "billionaire-said-a-thing" news where billionaires imply that their tech will result in huge benefits that will be delivered by someone else once they amass their fortunes.

Musk is the most obvious. He publicly proclaims his mission to create technology that ensures we all live better, healthier lives, while routinely violating labor, safety, and environmental laws and insisting his employees work 60-hour weeks with minimal vacation in order to give him a shot at becoming the world’s first trillionaire.

I wish the press would push back once in a while.

stuaxo•about 4 hours ago

Yeah billionaires don't want to pay any money to the society that enabled them.

SpicyLemonZest•about 4 hours ago

The headline is clearly crafted to make you think that so that you'll click on it. The contents make it clear that he's really saying something different and much more aligned with your thoughts. He thinks that in a world where labor is less valuable, UBI won't be enough; the average person in a post-work future needs to have a genuine ownership stake in the AI compute that's making things happen, not just welfare funded from the profits of the billionaires who own it.

biimugan•about 2 hours ago

A "genuine ownership stake in the AI compute that's making things happen" sounds to me like corpo-speak for "taxpayer-funded bailout of my unprofitable company". After all, if everyone has a stake in AI, and AI crashes, then everyone (not just OpenAI) loses their money

aggakake•about 1 hour ago

Now that you mention it! He's been big on bailouts recently! Socialize the losses ...

tadfisher•about 4 hours ago

> the average person in a post-work future needs to have a genuine ownership stake in the AI compute that's making things happen, not just welfare funded from the profits of the billionaires who own it

I've heard this said and can only imagine babies being born with stock options in OpenAI; in which case, there is not really much difference between your two scenarios.

Otherwise, how are you going to distribute ownership of AI compute, if no one has jobs to earn it?

SpicyLemonZest•about 1 hour ago

There was a study a while back in Germany which showed (https://cepr.org/voxeu/columns/identity-and-wellbeing-how-re..., ht Matt Yglesias) that people in retirement are happier than people economically equivalent unemployment. People's understanding of the system and how they relate to it is an important factor.

If 50% of the population understand themselves to belong to a permanent leisure class, who are entitled to simply go through life hosting dinners and grabbing drinks and taking walks in the park whenever they'd like, that's probably an OK future. The pathway from here to there is scary, and you'd have to think about how to manage the other 50% outbidding them for positional goods, but you could imagine it working out.

If 50% of the population understand themselves to belong to a permanent underclass, dependent on the largesse of the other 50% to keep them alive, they're going to be extraordinarily motivated to burn things down. Even if the other 50% establish a generous welfare system, perhaps so generous that you can obtain all the same goods and services that you could in the first scenario, it wouldn't solve the problem.

cyanydeez•about 4 hours ago

And UBI said by billionaires is like lube wielded by a rapist.

xaxfixho•about 3 hours ago

anyone remember: pushing back the "veil of ignorance" Q-Star Q*

Sam Altman falls out of love with universal basic income

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