Sarah Polcz (UC Davis) and Jeremy Bearer-Friend (George Washington University), An AI Tax Could Be the Great Equalizer America Needs, published in TIME:

An idea that until recently would have been seen as radical—that the public should co-own AI—now commands bipartisan consensus.

In June, Senator Bernie Sanders introduced the first AI tax in history, the American AI Sovereign Wealth Fund Act, which took up our AI equity tax framework. The bill proposes making the biggest AI companies owe the public half the equity in each company’s AI business, paid in newly issued shares. 

In the weeks since, OpenAI’s Sam Altman and President Donald Trump have scrambled to compete, offering their own visions of an AI sovereign wealth fund, which, unlike a tax, would be voluntarily created through the companies’ partnership with the government. Specifically, the ChatGPT creator is reportedly considering giving the U.S. government a 5% stake in the company. We believe this approach is a mistake—and a tax is the solution.