Moshe Lander

I don't like it.

I think that it makes for good print, but it doesn't work in practice.

Let's take the bot out of the story.

Let's say that Eric replaces me at my job.

So should Eric be taxed then because he replaced me at my job and he should give me his money to pay for me?

On a certain level, that does happen.

Employed people pay for unemployed people, but you don't have that direct replacement where the person who's doing a better job has to subsidize the person who was doing a worse job.

Well, if you wanted to tax somebody, then it would be the owner of the capital.

That's no different than if somebody at McDonald's gets replaced by a machine, then you tax the machine owner.

The who part isn't the problem.

It's merely the concept.

But, you know, let's think of something slightly different then.

A hundred fifty years ago, there was a thriving blacksmith industry in Montreal.

All of those horses clip clopping around in the old port needed shoes.

And so these blacksmiths were extremely profitable until they saw a car drive over the Champlain Bridge.

And at that point, then it was, well, we can either try and tax the bot.

Or we can recognize that this is the price of progress.

And all of those people that lost their jobs and obliterated the blacksmith industry had jobs within 10 to 20 years in metal bashing.

And at the time, if you had asked those blacksmiths, what does your future look like now that the car is coming?

They would have never imagined that.