Will – this reads as much like a treatise on the new-age billionaire as it does a critique of OpenAI’s policy brief, especially when you juxtapose today’s tech and AI elite with the old-guard wealth of the original Gilded Age. Carnegie’s “Gospel of Wealth” and J.P. Morgan’s example (think Panic of 1907) show there has always been a silent expectation - a noblesse oblige if I may - that those who sit atop a new industrial order must do more than issue lofty ideals and policy PDFs to earn their position at the "top" but rather assume personal risk and make visible sacrifices that bind their fortunes to the public’s fate.
In that sense, there is now (arguably) a clear populist demand for the modern tech/AI billionaire to do something similar: to stake a meaningful portion of their own capital – financial, social, and political – on the future they are building and prescribing to earn the "mandate" of the governed. This clearly means pushing beyond simply recommending what government ought to do, but rather personally leading, funding, and absorbing the backlash of a realignment that tangibly benefits the communities hosting the data centers and bearing the displacement. This disposition shift that must be forged through deliberate, strategic engagement by those with real skin in the game.
The populist backlash you describe is, fundamentally, the product of the gap here. The American public does not and arguably should trust AI or its leading architects because there has been no visible, visionary effort to earn their consent – no equivalent of the labor settlements, wealth transfers, and institutional compromises that underwrote the New Deal order after decades of industrial violence. Instead, they see discussion of trillion‑dollar IPO path, public-benefit branding without enforceable obligations, and policy briefs as opposed to discussions concerning the real transfers of value.
Over the next 18 months, closing that gap is the most important project any genuinely pro‑AI coalition could take on, because it will determine whether AI is integrated as shared national infrastructure or locked into a permanently adversarial posture with the communities and legislators who can stall it. If those with the greatest upside are unwilling to sacrifice earnings, status, and convenience now, the window will close, and what follows will look much more like the punitive, populist responses that ended prior industrial booms than the techno-optimistic “intelligence age” we all hope for and keep promising.
Great post and analysis - looking forward to reading more.
“We now have a set of technology companies that are strategically important to the United States -- important in ways that implicate national security, economic competitiveness, and the daily lives of hundreds of millions of people. These companies are capitalized at levels that rival nation-states. A huge share of GDP growth hangs on their success. They’re building infrastructure that will last for decades.”
Amazing essay, and yet the beliefs that have motivated it land remarkably short sighted (forgive me if I’ve misread you here). If this infrastructure lasts for decades it will mean we’ve stopped innovating as a country. Our models should become smaller and cheaper and more powerful and ideally not require such massive compute as laid out by these data centers. Let data center growth stagnate, and we’ll just continue to use better, smaller, and cheaper models right? They just may not be made by OpenAI or the other frontier labs…
interesting piece and thoughtful analysis, severely lacking in citations though. so many claims stated as facts and not a single reference or mention of where you are getting them..
What a thought provoking piece. I also read the OpenAi document this afternoon but I was encouraged that somewhat finally addressed the elephant in the room. Aka what about all the peeps who lose their jobs or in the case of loan bearing graduates never get jobs
A wealth tax
An AI premium
A solution for healthcare and pensions.
Great job!.
I really liked the idea of a shorter working week and an AI premium paid for out of corporation tax and capital gains. The recognition that the individual taxation will fall, and people will lead different lives
This is a topic I am currently exploring in my novel Driverless
What might be a positive outcome for normal working people.
We need to work towards a utopia that beckons and could be the next revolution beyond the industrial revolution, beyond the services industry revolution, a new world where work is optional and people can follow their passions.
That is the question that I think about?
How can we reach a human utopia powered by robots and AI, as opposed to the normal dystopias we normally see depicted in film and on TV.
So Driverless speculates about what a future dominated by AI, Autonomous vehicles & robots might look like.
The Novel is a road trip featuring Scarlett England's last trucker, but as she passes through different EU countries she sees how they have responded to this revolution of work in different ways with radically different outcomes for their inhabitants.
What I was trying to do was find a best possible solution: Switzerland and contrast it with half-hearted reform; the UK and full on chaos: Hungary and it gets worse…
Will – this reads as much like a treatise on the new-age billionaire as it does a critique of OpenAI’s policy brief, especially when you juxtapose today’s tech and AI elite with the old-guard wealth of the original Gilded Age. Carnegie’s “Gospel of Wealth” and J.P. Morgan’s example (think Panic of 1907) show there has always been a silent expectation - a noblesse oblige if I may - that those who sit atop a new industrial order must do more than issue lofty ideals and policy PDFs to earn their position at the "top" but rather assume personal risk and make visible sacrifices that bind their fortunes to the public’s fate.
In that sense, there is now (arguably) a clear populist demand for the modern tech/AI billionaire to do something similar: to stake a meaningful portion of their own capital – financial, social, and political – on the future they are building and prescribing to earn the "mandate" of the governed. This clearly means pushing beyond simply recommending what government ought to do, but rather personally leading, funding, and absorbing the backlash of a realignment that tangibly benefits the communities hosting the data centers and bearing the displacement. This disposition shift that must be forged through deliberate, strategic engagement by those with real skin in the game.
The populist backlash you describe is, fundamentally, the product of the gap here. The American public does not and arguably should trust AI or its leading architects because there has been no visible, visionary effort to earn their consent – no equivalent of the labor settlements, wealth transfers, and institutional compromises that underwrote the New Deal order after decades of industrial violence. Instead, they see discussion of trillion‑dollar IPO path, public-benefit branding without enforceable obligations, and policy briefs as opposed to discussions concerning the real transfers of value.
Over the next 18 months, closing that gap is the most important project any genuinely pro‑AI coalition could take on, because it will determine whether AI is integrated as shared national infrastructure or locked into a permanently adversarial posture with the communities and legislators who can stall it. If those with the greatest upside are unwilling to sacrifice earnings, status, and convenience now, the window will close, and what follows will look much more like the punitive, populist responses that ended prior industrial booms than the techno-optimistic “intelligence age” we all hope for and keep promising.
Great post and analysis - looking forward to reading more.
“We now have a set of technology companies that are strategically important to the United States -- important in ways that implicate national security, economic competitiveness, and the daily lives of hundreds of millions of people. These companies are capitalized at levels that rival nation-states. A huge share of GDP growth hangs on their success. They’re building infrastructure that will last for decades.”
Amazing essay, and yet the beliefs that have motivated it land remarkably short sighted (forgive me if I’ve misread you here). If this infrastructure lasts for decades it will mean we’ve stopped innovating as a country. Our models should become smaller and cheaper and more powerful and ideally not require such massive compute as laid out by these data centers. Let data center growth stagnate, and we’ll just continue to use better, smaller, and cheaper models right? They just may not be made by OpenAI or the other frontier labs…
interesting piece and thoughtful analysis, severely lacking in citations though. so many claims stated as facts and not a single reference or mention of where you are getting them..
What a thought provoking piece. I also read the OpenAi document this afternoon but I was encouraged that somewhat finally addressed the elephant in the room. Aka what about all the peeps who lose their jobs or in the case of loan bearing graduates never get jobs
A wealth tax
An AI premium
A solution for healthcare and pensions.
Great job!.
I really liked the idea of a shorter working week and an AI premium paid for out of corporation tax and capital gains. The recognition that the individual taxation will fall, and people will lead different lives
This is a topic I am currently exploring in my novel Driverless
What might be a positive outcome for normal working people.
We need to work towards a utopia that beckons and could be the next revolution beyond the industrial revolution, beyond the services industry revolution, a new world where work is optional and people can follow their passions.
That is the question that I think about?
How can we reach a human utopia powered by robots and AI, as opposed to the normal dystopias we normally see depicted in film and on TV.
So Driverless speculates about what a future dominated by AI, Autonomous vehicles & robots might look like.
The Novel is a road trip featuring Scarlett England's last trucker, but as she passes through different EU countries she sees how they have responded to this revolution of work in different ways with radically different outcomes for their inhabitants.
What I was trying to do was find a best possible solution: Switzerland and contrast it with half-hearted reform; the UK and full on chaos: Hungary and it gets worse…
https://sallyannmeliascifi.substack.com/p/driverless-by-s-a-melia-table-of?utm_source=share&utm_medium=android&r=tuoc9