If AI replaces workers, should it also pay taxes? – The technological race among industry giants and the wave of layoffs they have announced has revived the debate about the advisability of taxing automation.
https://english.elpais.com/technology/2025-11-30/if-ai-replaces-workers-should-it-also-pay-taxes.html
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From the articleÂ
It can’t be seen or touched, but it’s shaking up markets and attracting investment. Artificial intelligence (AI) has become the object of desire for Big Tech, which is pouring astronomical sums into its development, fueled by record profits. The other side of this frenzy is workforce reductions, with automation as the backdrop, announced by multinationals like Amazon, Meta, and UPS, which, incidentally, threaten to extend the impact of new technologies to another area: public coffers. Fewer people working means fewer taxpayers, so the question naturally arises: if machines and algorithms replace humans in their jobs, should they also have to cover the taxes that humans stop paying?
If it doesnt happen before AI begins taking jobs (like right now) then it never will.
Maybe the power they consume should be at a higher rate.
any business or corporation that ’employs’ AI or uses AI to replace human workers pays more taxes. much more.
If most people don’t have to work, does money need to exist?
When signalling to shareholders goes wrong
We’ll see but imo this shit is so ridiculously overhyped. Probably harsh of me but if generative ai as is is taking your job you were pretty much fungible anyway. In my industry a few companies that have done this very quietly went and rehired people.
Companies who dont use AI should get a tax rebate for employing living people who then pay taxes. AI-free is the next revolution.
you sound like our government has the brain capacity to do that.
No, its not a person, it doesnt need social security or Medicare, or federal Govt help, food stamps, roads, infrastructure, etc. It has no personhood. This is an insane line of thinking that you tax “AI”. How do you even quantify that? It makes no damn sense. Whats next? Are we gonna retroactively tax telephone exchanges for getting rid of switchboard girls?
Whomever thought of this idea needs to be slapped in the mouth.
If I get taxed for owning an electric vehicle due to lost gas tax revenue then we can tax AI for lost income tax revenue.
Not sure how, but profits made from AI work should be taxed very high, and used to pay UBI.
I no longer believe any of this will be happening any time soon.
Corporate taxes are already a thing. And the owners will pay taxes on the resultant capital gains. So there is nothing meaningful to change here.
Society already has a desperate need for workers in the housing building business, so any AI displaced workers already have somewhere to go.
Should replace our POTUS are current President sleeps and plays golf all day long
If the end game in a hypothetical scenario like this is to fully replace labor with automation, then the wealth hoarders should absolutely get hosed. But corporate power should have been taxed to the point where they couldn’t engage hype bubbles like this to always make the line go up in the first place.
If tractor replaces workers, should it pay taxes?
And other tools?
A lot of companies have the current tax benefits they have because of hiring promises. Let’s see who forgets.
No. Solar panels and batteries are replacing coal and gas projects. Are we asking the green energy industry to start paying their fare share of people who lost their jobs or any royalties associated with mining
Nope – we are subsiding green energy. It’s similar logic with AI.
Thats so funny to me. Of course rich stockholders and CEOs and such should pay taxes.
Bill gates has been advocating for AI and automation to pay tax for like 15 years.
No one listened to him.
Tax it and heavily regulate it.
Stifling innovation is not an excuse to ignore the social and economic implications these ill defined technologies will have on the world.
All AI is controlled by large corporations, they are not independent entities. You need to tax the corporations appropriately.
Why don’t we eliminate bullshit jobs while we’re out here eliminating jobs.
Haha! Hell no, they’re not going to do that. Just think of how much industrialization, automation, and computer technology has increased the productivity per worker over the past 70 years. Also consider how much globalization has resulted in lost domestic jobs. Finally consider the fact that in spite of these two other facts, taxes for corporations and the ultra wealthy have actually gone DOWN. It’s a race to the bottom until we inevitably wrap back around to feudal serfdom.
I would say yes, tax the autonoms in same way as people are. They want to use USA’s land, electricity and infrastructure to create and sell goods to USA citizens. Therefore taxing them is okay because they’re workers too.Â