In Our Glorious AI Future, There Will Be No Such Thing as Money (For You)

“A.I. capacity may soon displace oil or enriched uranium as the resource that dictates the global balance of power. [Open AI’s C.E.O.] Sam Altman has said that computing power is ‘the currency of the future.’” — The New Yorker

Gather around, everyday working people, and allow me to lay out a grand vision for a brave new world. A world in which all economic functions are done by computers and robots. A world where the very concept of having money no longer exists (for all of you).

“How does this work?” You ask in excitement and awe. “Surely there must be some form of standardized economic unit that facilitates the exchange of goods and services.” And yes, there will be, of course. But you don’t have to worry about that, because you will simply have none of it. Only I and like twelve other people will have it.

Does that track? In the future, there is such a thing as money. But there’s no such thing as your money. All the money is our money.

This is the post-capitalist utopia you’ve always dreamed of, is it not? Gone is a competitive economic system where talent, skill, and hard work yield economic gains (for you). Gone is the notion that striving will result in a better station in life (for you). Gone is the accumulation of wealth and property (for you). Gone even is very the concept of ownership (for you). Those things exist only for us now. They are our cross to bear.

Look, we’ve even solved the inequality problem, because every human on Earth will be equally moneyless (except for us).

And did you see our plan to eliminate income taxes? Please, don’t thank us. How could we, in good conscience, tax your income when you won’t have any such income to tax? That would be nonsensical and cruel. All that we ask instead is that you regularly pay a tribute to us in the form of a portion of your food ration, or by performing some of the degrading and/or dangerous tasks we’ve not yet figured out how to delegate to machines. Or perhaps by providing a scant liter or two of your blood so that we might finally solve humankind’s oldest problem, the problem of mortality. For us, at least. (You will all still die.)

Sorry, did I hear someone say “universal basic income”? Yes, exactly. As a universal rule, we’ll get basically all of the income. That’s a great way to describe it. You can keep some of your blood as a reward for your cleverness.

Honestly, you should be thankful we’re freeing you from the burden of having massive amounts of money. Can you imagine the countless hours we’ll spend arranging it all into different piles? And besides, we’re going to have to spend a good chunk of it on bunkers and machine-gun-wielding robot dogs to protect us from the mass social unrest we’re creating, so we’re all kind of breaking even here anyway.

I understand that this may seem like a tremendous amount of change. But don’t worry, many things are staying the same. You’ll still have war, famine, riots, violent crime, authoritarian governments, mass incarceration, poverty, disease, and ever-worsening environmental disasters. I promise, with all my heart, that none of those things will ever go away (for you).