How to fund an AI Dividend from the engine of automation itself: make cloud computing a public utility, set prices above raw computational cost, and channel the difference into universal basic income.
Good to explore creatively. And, I think a more fitting label is that you propose to *extend*, to further socialization of IT infrastructure. Recognize what's *already* socialized, as military and spy machinery for U.S. national-state primacy (Farrell and Newman 2023, https://bit.ly/FarNew-2023 ).
And you err in blurring Norway's sovereign wealth fund from fossil fuels. Not true, what you wrote here:
"We also have modern models. Just as oil-rich nations like Norway use natural resources to fund social programs, we can harness the defining resource of the 21st century—computation—for the public good."
Nordic populations have been typically hostile to UBI. For example 71% of Swedes opposed, in 2020, a hypothetical proposal to start a UBI: see the analysis by sociologist Max Koch (2021: 7, https://bit.ly/KochMa-2021 ). Nordic welfare states don't run on unconditional transfers to adults able to work, notwithstanding Finland's much-discussed, localized pilot parallel that came to a draw. Bo Rothstein's 2017 Social Europe brief against UBI from his expertise in Nordic welfare policy developments, is lucid. ( https://bit.ly/RothB-2017 ). For a wider-ranging roundup with eyes on the USA. see sociologist Jeff Manza in Theory and Society, 2023 ( https://bit.ly/ManzaJ-2023_TS ).
You also err in suggesting that computation is "the defining resource of the 21st century" as contrasted with oil and such fuels. That's false. These systems run hard on fossil fuels, rare earths, freshwater, and major land use changes destructive of biophysical resources. For a start on that, see Chu (2024, https://on.ft.com/4chyMNI) and Gupta, Bosch, and van Vilet (2024, https://bit.ly/GuBovV-2024-3_21 ).
Good to explore creatively. And, I think a more fitting label is that you propose to *extend*, to further socialization of IT infrastructure. Recognize what's *already* socialized, as military and spy machinery for U.S. national-state primacy (Farrell and Newman 2023, https://bit.ly/FarNew-2023 ).
And you err in blurring Norway's sovereign wealth fund from fossil fuels. Not true, what you wrote here:
"We also have modern models. Just as oil-rich nations like Norway use natural resources to fund social programs, we can harness the defining resource of the 21st century—computation—for the public good."
Nordic populations have been typically hostile to UBI. For example 71% of Swedes opposed, in 2020, a hypothetical proposal to start a UBI: see the analysis by sociologist Max Koch (2021: 7, https://bit.ly/KochMa-2021 ). Nordic welfare states don't run on unconditional transfers to adults able to work, notwithstanding Finland's much-discussed, localized pilot parallel that came to a draw. Bo Rothstein's 2017 Social Europe brief against UBI from his expertise in Nordic welfare policy developments, is lucid. ( https://bit.ly/RothB-2017 ). For a wider-ranging roundup with eyes on the USA. see sociologist Jeff Manza in Theory and Society, 2023 ( https://bit.ly/ManzaJ-2023_TS ).
You also err in suggesting that computation is "the defining resource of the 21st century" as contrasted with oil and such fuels. That's false. These systems run hard on fossil fuels, rare earths, freshwater, and major land use changes destructive of biophysical resources. For a start on that, see Chu (2024, https://on.ft.com/4chyMNI) and Gupta, Bosch, and van Vilet (2024, https://bit.ly/GuBovV-2024-3_21 ).
I also just became a paid annual subscriber. Great and innovative article.
THIS is what we need to have Dems talking about! Do more on this topic!
On the strength of this piece alone (although I like all of your pieces), I'm going to become an annual subscriber!