Bernie Sanders: The Public Should Own Half of the Big A.I. Companies (opens in new tab)

(nytimes.com)

17 pointstimmg22d ago15 comments

15 comments

14 comments · 6 top-level

postflopclarity22d ago· 5 in thread

Don't be a ridiculous socialist, clearly 50% is too much. The true capitalists believe that the USG should only own

* 10% of Intel

* 15% vig of Nvidia chip sales to China

* largest shareholder in several materials and mining companies

* option for 8% of Westinghouse

* "Golden Share" of U.S. Steel

damnitbuilds22d ago

I think you'll find the USG is only holding those shares temporarily and they will be transferred to ... someone ... just before January 20th, 2029.

daveshistory22d ago

I understand the cynicism but there isn't going to be a plausible legal route to do that. No, all these corporate stakes are just going to hang on bizarrely in the government until someone sells them off again.

Although, I guess, you can't really just dump a 10% stake in Intel overnight without causing problems, can you. Geez what a mess.

red-iron-pine22d ago

since when has "plausible legal route" meant anything in the past 12 months?

damnitbuilds22d ago

Someone could make a decent amount by buying a short the day before the dump...

1 more reply

tqi20d ago

I think people are opposed to all of these.

richwater22d ago· 2 in thread

Yet another completely un-implementable, insane take from someone who has accomplished very little in the way of legislation. I mean seriously? We're going to start to seize companies now? What even is an "AI" company? Google trains their own model? Are we going to seize Google? Give me a break. This is real life slop and would never get published if it weren't for the author's name.

postflopclarity22d ago

> We're going to start to seize companies now?

already started by the current administration?

daveshistory22d ago

US government already has a minority stake in Intel. Seems to be the season for this sort of thing.

You're right, though. New York Times printing calls for the nationalization of "all the big companies..."

tmvphil22d ago· 1 in thread

A big 50% transfer of specific companies is probably too aggressive and arbitrary, but it's time to start thinking about how public ownership can work. Perhaps something like, "every year, companies over some size threshold must dilute their shares by 1% and give the new shares to the USG"

whalabi21d ago

His argument, whether you accept it or not, is that AI was built with humanity's stolen knowledge for the most part, which is somewhat accurate.

At least, models were trained on vast quantities of information produced by humans, much of it copyrighted, without consent or compensation.

"Zuckerberg approved Meta’s use of ‘pirated’ books to train AI models, authors claim" https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2025/jan/10/mark-zuck...

whalabi21d ago

Gift article if that helps: https://www.nytimes.com/2026/06/01/opinion/artificial-intell...

sometimelurker22d ago

I think he knows this is too vague and unimplementable, he just wants to shift the conversation to more UBI-ish things.

red-iron-pine22d ago

how much you wanna bet this gets traction right as the bubble is about to pop?

j / k navigate · click thread line to collapse

15 comments

14 comments · 6 top-level

postflopclarity22d ago· 5 in thread

Don't be a ridiculous socialist, clearly 50% is too much. The true capitalists believe that the USG should only own

* 10% of Intel

* 15% vig of Nvidia chip sales to China

* largest shareholder in several materials and mining companies

* option for 8% of Westinghouse

* "Golden Share" of U.S. Steel

damnitbuilds22d ago

I think you'll find the USG is only holding those shares temporarily and they will be transferred to ... someone ... just before January 20th, 2029.

daveshistory22d ago

Although, I guess, you can't really just dump a 10% stake in Intel overnight without causing problems, can you. Geez what a mess.

red-iron-pine22d ago

since when has "plausible legal route" meant anything in the past 12 months?

damnitbuilds22d ago

Someone could make a decent amount by buying a short the day before the dump...

1 more reply

tqi20d ago

I think people are opposed to all of these.

richwater22d ago· 2 in thread

postflopclarity22d ago

> We're going to start to seize companies now?

already started by the current administration?

daveshistory22d ago

US government already has a minority stake in Intel. Seems to be the season for this sort of thing.

You're right, though. New York Times printing calls for the nationalization of "all the big companies..."

tmvphil22d ago· 1 in thread

whalabi21d ago

His argument, whether you accept it or not, is that AI was built with humanity's stolen knowledge for the most part, which is somewhat accurate.

At least, models were trained on vast quantities of information produced by humans, much of it copyrighted, without consent or compensation.

"Zuckerberg approved Meta’s use of ‘pirated’ books to train AI models, authors claim" https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2025/jan/10/mark-zuck...

whalabi21d ago

Gift article if that helps: https://www.nytimes.com/2026/06/01/opinion/artificial-intell...

sometimelurker22d ago

I think he knows this is too vague and unimplementable, he just wants to shift the conversation to more UBI-ish things.

red-iron-pine22d ago

how much you wanna bet this gets traction right as the bubble is about to pop?

j / k navigate · click thread line to collapse