San Francisco Robot Tax

California politician initiates new law to tax robots

The city of San Fran. want to reap from robots 

San Francisco supervisor Jane Kim is leading a legislative initiative to make taxing robots a law. Through her committee she founded named jobs of the future fund, she is getting the message out about the perils of automation taking jobs away from San Franciscans and Californians.

As jobs are lost, Kim and her group contend, companies should pay a portion of the lost state taxes into a fund to be used for "education, retraining, and targeted investments in new industries."

The next step, it seems, after this is established, is to extend the income tax to robots:

"We're exploring continuing the payroll tax and extending it to robots that perform jobs humans currently do," Kim explains. Companies would pay into a fund, the same payroll tax and social security the replaced worker was due.

Opposition to the tax makes three main points. The first is that robots can perform jobs that go unfilled. Second, taxing innovation will stifle economic growth. And third, technology creates newer higher paying jobs. Source

With 72% of Americans worried about job loss to robots and being less than optimistic about the future of work according to Pew Research, it seems that this initiative will gain popular support, especially in places like tax-happy California. 

Silicon Valley, possibly heading off mass taxation that may be coming their way, have initiated basic income trials to study the viability and effect of giving people monthly payments with no strings attached.