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posted by on Sunday February 19 2017, @05:49PM   Printer-friendly
from the robots-are-not-covered-by-the-sixteenth-amendment dept.

Bill Gates, the co-founder of Microsoft and world's richest man, said in an interview Friday that robots that steal human jobs should pay their fair share of taxes.

"Right now, the human worker who does, say, $50,000 worth of work in a factory, that income is taxed and you get income tax, Social Security tax, all those things," he said. "If a robot comes in to do the same thing, you'd think that we'd tax the robot at a similar level."

Gates made the remark during an interview with Quartz. He said robot taxes could help fund projects like caring for the elderly or working with children in school. Quartz reported that European Union lawmakers considered a proposal to tax robots in the past. The law was rejected.

Recode, citing a McKinsey report, said that 50 percent of jobs performed by humans are vulnerable to robots, which could result in the loss of about $2.7 trillion in the U.S. alone.

"Exactly how you'd do it, measure it, you know, it's interesting for people to start talking about now," Gates said. "Some of it can come on the profits that are generated by the labor-saving efficiency there. Some of it can come directly in some type of robot tax. I don't think the robot companies are going to be outraged that there might be a tax. It's OK."

http://www.foxnews.com/tech/2017/02/18/robots-that-steal-human-jobs-should-pay-taxes-gates-says.html

-- submitted from IRC


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  • (Score: 2) by opinionated_science on Sunday February 19 2017, @06:29PM

    by opinionated_science (4031) on Sunday February 19 2017, @06:29PM (#469010)

    Has someone checked his meds? He's making some quite poorly thought out comments recently.
    Then again, that appears to be a trend....

    Starting Score:    1  point
    Karma-Bonus Modifier   +1  

    Total Score:   2  
  • (Score: 2, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday February 19 2017, @06:43PM

    by Anonymous Coward on Sunday February 19 2017, @06:43PM (#469017)

    It must be something in the water. Better check the EPA... oops.

  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday February 19 2017, @06:43PM

    by Anonymous Coward on Sunday February 19 2017, @06:43PM (#469018)

    > Then again, that appears to be a trend....

    Which you seem to have joined with your vapid complaint.

    • (Score: 3, Funny) by aristarchus on Sunday February 19 2017, @07:25PM

      by aristarchus (2645) on Sunday February 19 2017, @07:25PM (#469037) Journal

      > Then again, that appears to be a trend....

      Which you seem to have joined with your vapid complaint.

      Here's mine! Am I too late? I've heard it is never too late to be vaporid on SoylentNews. Fashionably vapid. But thank $diety that we are not talking about Zuckerborg's "manifesto". See? Feel better? At least we Soylentils are not that vaporish.

  • (Score: 4, Insightful) by tisI on Monday February 20 2017, @12:50AM

    by tisI (5866) on Monday February 20 2017, @12:50AM (#469119)

    I was think'in the same thing. WTF is BG smoking? How do you income tax an object of factory automation that has displaced a person from their job? Who or what is being taxed and what for? How do you tax a new motor that runs a conveyor belt that replaced a bunch of step-and-fetch-its?

    Bill Gates needs some new taxes to pay so he can stop trying to help others so much, that are better off without him.

    --
    "Suppose you were an idiot...and suppose you were a member of Congress...but I repeat myself."
  • (Score: 3, Insightful) by donkeyhotay on Monday February 20 2017, @04:57PM

    by donkeyhotay (2540) on Monday February 20 2017, @04:57PM (#469316)

    Ha! Bill Gates has always been pretty unimpressive, intellectually. His only technical achievement was that BASIC interpreter for the Altair, and even that wasn't accomplished on his own. 90% of his wealth can be attributed to dumb luck. I will never understand how people can elevate the man who was responsible for Windows 98. Reboot. Reboot. Reboot... I'm still pissed about it.